Alice in Wonderland

Bunin, puppetoonist extraordinaire, encountered many frustrations during his lengthy battle to bring his Carroll to the screen (the quaint live action prologue is directed by Bower). First he came up against Technicolor, who refused to handle the processing, thus forcing him to use inferior Ansco Color. Then he was drummed off the screen for daring to release his film in the same year as Disney's all-American version. And finally, Bunin discovered that he sailed too close to the satirical winds by identifying an imperious Queen Victoria (Brown) with the off-with-his-head Queen of Hearts, thus keeping the film out of Britain. Bunin employs a diverting combination of actors and puppets against a simple Klee-like background: purists will enjoy moaning at the songs while acknowledging that elsewhere he maintains the sharpness of the original.