Recently I had the opportunity to watch Disney's old cartoon "classic" Alice in Wonderland....the first time I have seen this movie since I was a very young kid. The movie itself was alright I suppose...though the dialouge certainly is pretty dated and the music pretty campy. However mostly I wanted to write this review to de-bunk some of the urban legends surrounding this story. Namely those of the "many" drug references this story contains. Contrary to popular belief...there is actually no evidence that Lewis Carroll ever took any Hallucinogenic substances or narcotic substances in his life. The Lewis Carroll institute has preserved many of Carrolls letters and memoirs and none of these have references about Carroll "experimenting" with any substance. Remember also that back in the 19th century no substances were actually illegal so there wouldn't have been any incentive for Carroll NOT to mention these in any of his letters. Now...there goes without saying that there are numerous "questionable" scenes in both the book and this cartoon which certainly can be interpreted as being a subliminal drug message. My particular "favorite" in the cartoon would have to be when Alice meets up with the caterpillar who is smoking a hooka on top of a large mushroom and the caterpillar changes color several times...As well as Alice eating a mushroom to become Taller or smaller. But like I said no actual evidence exists that this story was inspired by drug trips despite the popular culture opinion that it was.
That being said...like I said the Dialouge in this cartoon is extremely dated...and the music mostly campy and unmemorable. But it still was semi-enjoyable due to its short length and for some of those "subjective" scenes" I discussed in the previous paragraph.
That being said...like I said the Dialouge in this cartoon is extremely dated...and the music mostly campy and unmemorable. But it still was semi-enjoyable due to its short length and for some of those "subjective" scenes" I discussed in the previous paragraph.