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Dreamchild | 
 enlarge | Director: Gavin Millar
Actors: Coral Browne, Ian Holm, Peter Gallagher, Nicola Cowper, Jane Asher
Studio: MGM (Video & DVD)
Category: Video
List Price: $14.95
Buy Used: $7.95
You Save: $7.00 (47%)
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Rating:  22 reviews
Sales Rank: 1092
Format: Color, Ntsc
Language: English (Original Language)
Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Media: VHS Tape
Number Of Items: 1
Running Time: 94
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 7.3 x 4.2 x 1.1
ISBN: 6302717655
UPC: 027616276735
EAN: 9786302717655
ASIN: 6302717655
Theatrical Release Date: October 4, 1985
Release Date: September 1, 1998
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Amazon.com
This 1985 film from Britain offers up the only possible reason the extraordinary British writer Dennis Potter could be involved with a project also featuring the talents of Jim Henson's Muppets. The subject is the awkward relationship between Charles Dodgson (Ian Holm), better known to the world as Lewis Carroll, and Alice Liddell (played by Coral Browne as an adult), as it was in the 19th century when Liddell inspired Carroll to create Alice In Wonderland and Alice Through the Looking Glass. The full account of that bond is finally told by Alice in 1932, as she arrives in New York City to participate in the 100th anniversary of Dodgson's birth. Flustered by press and public attention, Alice releases her repressed memories from that time, and Henson's factory does a wonderful job creating bold realizations of the author's characters and settings. Both dark and light, Dreamchild is a mesmerizing spectacle with inner portraits of two quite dissimilar but equally vulnerable people. Holm is excellent as the stammering, often ridiculed Dodgson. --Tom Keogh
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| Customer Reviews: Read 17 more reviews...
 An Unsual Take August 11, 2008
The centenary of Lewis Carroll's death is fast approaching, and the inspiration for Alice (Coral Browne) is coming to America for the festivities. She is a proper old woman with a sharp tongue and with very little interest in revisiting her childhood memories. It is only when an out of work reporter (David Gallagher) enters the picture that she decides to open up, and then only because she is paid for it. The memories are painful because of the strange fascination that Carroll (Ian Holm) had for her (Amelia Shankley), but upon reflection she is able to come to terms with it.
An interesting take on the story of Alice in Wonderland, much the same way that Hook was a new slant on Peter Pan, Dreamchild alternates between childlike fantasy and very mature themes. It opens with Jim Henson's puppets and automatically one assumes the story will be juvenile, but first impressions are decieving. Most of the puppets are rather menacing, evidenced especially in the scene with the Mad Hatter. He looks like he has been decaying for years with his green skin and pinkish eyes. The March Hare is equally terrifying because of his threatening behaviour, matted fur, and large teeth. The scene is very telling of Alice's fear of her past and how much she has neglected it.
The story is set in the 30s and the sets and costumes are done very well. Nothing seems overtly showy and the actors seem comfortable in their surroundings. In the scenes of Alice's childhood, the outdoors are illuminated brightly and beautifully so as to convey a sense of happiness.
The most memorable part of this movie is the ending. It is an emotional close to an unusual story acted brilliantly by Holm, Shankley, and alternately Browne, and credit is due to director Gavin Millar for bringing it together so well.
 A dissertation on childhood memory suppression January 17, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I'm surprised to read some of the reviews here; I saw this movie when it came out, and it struck me as one of the most elegant and clever treatises on molestation-survivor memory suppression. Perhaps I imbued the film with a darker agenda than it actually had, but I don't think so.
The way it unfolded for me, older Alice's increasing anxiety as she nears New York City and the Lewis Carroll tribute is caused by the fact that she is forced to reminisce about her childhood relationship with Carroll more extensively than she has ever allowed herself to. Her rejection of the value of the book he wrote (and of fantasy in general) seemed to me to be a perfect way to show her displaced anger.
So even though the inappropriate relationship was left off-camera, so to speak, I thought the film explored the idea with masterful taste and psychological insight.
I think if you approach the film with the idea in mind that it might be investigating molestation, suppression and denial issues in a creative and artistic way, using a most famous man-and-girl relationship, you may find it rich with added layers of meaning. If this is an area that interests you, you may appreciate Greg Araki's "Mysterious Skin" from 2004. A harsher, less rarified or elegant film, it explores the way the devastating impact of molestation by the same perpetrator on two boys manifests in very different ways years later.
Alice in WonderFilm July 20, 2006
5 out of 5 found this review helpful
A picturesque and thoughtful movie for grownups whose plot shifts effortlessly between three venues: the 1860s when Lewis Carroll introduced the Wonderland tales to young, dark-haired Alice Liddell and her sisters - the 1930s when the aged Alice Liddell Hargreaves visited the U.S. just months before her death - and the surreal story-world of Alice in Wonderland with the characters that Alice meets portrayed by wickedly designed Jim Henson puppets.
Four affecting performances stand out in my memory: Coral Browne as the starchy old Alice - Amelia Shankley as the young self centered Alice - Nicola Cowper as old Alice's timid companion who becomes the love interest to a young American reporter (portrayed by Peter Gallagher) - and, in a small role, Caris Corfman as a wistful newspaper reporter. But those are only a few of many fine British and American actors (fine - except for one brief but noticeable exception).
My only major gripe is Ian Holm's age. Holm was in his early 50s when he portrayed Rev Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll's real name), while the real Dodgson was closer to 30 when he first told Alice the stories. Yes, there were concerns at the time about the purity of his interest in his child friends, such as Alice, who were also his photography subjects. Ian Holm's age and characterization exaggerate that frightful possibility.
On the positive side, this film took great care in evoking the respective time periods with beautiful sets, costumes and photography that compliment the deeply-felt emotional arc of old Alice revisiting her memories of Dodgson. As a result, the movie is itself an exotic journey into other times and places - with Alice, once again, as protagonist.
Gone but not forgotten... September 1, 2005
5 out of 6 found this review helpful
A very nice effort from Dennis Potter (the writer) and especially Coral Browne (the wife of Vincent Price) - a very young and handsome Peter Gallagher is quite fine as well. The story is engrossing and the Jim Henson puppet creations are odd and exceptional. Was the reverend a pedophile? Or does the attention that he lavishes on "Alice" represent a deeper connection? Might one go so far as to call it love? Whatever your conclusion - you will love this now-nearly-forgotten gem!
Who cares for you? You're nothing but a pack of cards! August 24, 2005
24 out of 26 found this review helpful
Let me start by simply saying that the reaction I had viewing this film was unlike any other viewing experience I can recall. Although I found it well written and produced, I was so disappointed by the 2/3's point that I almost stopped watching. Yet by the end I was absolutely embracing the whole thing. So if you are a Lewis Carroll fan keep an open mind and watch the whole thing, you may find the whole much greater than the sum of its parts. And you may even find yourself willing to accept the historical fiction as necessary to better tell the story.
I suppose a large part of my initial negative reaction was due to the film's puzzling failure to capture a fundamental aspect of Alice Liddell's childhood personality. Alice spent much of her time in "Wonderland" being p....d off; at the illogic, the rudeness, and the selfishness of the characters she met there. Both Alice's were proper and confident little Victorian girls who took themselves very seriously. I am sure that this was one of many "Real Alice" personality traits that Carroll transplanted to his "Wonderland" Alice. Often amused by her reactions of irritation and frustration, he constructed many of the story elements with the intention of getting indigent reactions from Alice and her sisters. I had hoped that this connection would be made by the film and was disappointed that it was not explored, although in retrospect you could argue that the older Alice's reactions to the characters she meets in America are identical to Alice's reactions to the characters in Wonderland. That the film does not explore my pet topic was disappointing but ultimately not fatal.
In all other respects the portrayal of young Alice Liddell was excellent. Amelia Shankley turned in a fine performance. She is clearly the best film Alice so far and it is a shame that they did not star her in an actual Alice film right after "Dreamchild" was completed. And Coral Browne was equally excellent as the older Alice.
This film is about how Alice's mother (who felt her daughter could find much better candidates for marriage as she moved into her teens) essentially poisoned her memories of Dodgson, leading her to believe that there was something wrong about his feelings for her (when in fact he was just a childlike personality who loved her more than his other child friends, but always with a shy innocence). It is also about the guilt the older Alice still feels over abandoning him just as she entered her teens, especially after all the innocent kindness he had shown. She is in denial about her affection for Dodgson and irritated because all the attention of his centennial is forcing her to recall those long-suppressed years of her life. And finally she feels that since she was not actually the little heroine who exhibited so much courage in "Wonderland", she does not deserve her sudden celebrity status. In her view she was catapulted into fame "by simply doing nothing". Remember that Wonderland Alice is arguably the bravest literary heroine of all time.
What ultimately redeems the film is the climatic scene in the hall of Columbia University. Alice Liddell flashes back to a scene late in her relationship with Dodgson, a symbolic scene meant to represent the end of their relationship. She had outgrown him at this point in her life and she laughs and humiliates him as he attempts to sing his Lobster Quadrille song to the three Liddell sisters and their male suitors. When her mind returns to the present she hears the Columbia University orchestra and glee club performing the same song. She realizes that the story which she once rejected was in fact his personal tribute to her and that even after all these years each little detail of his creation is admired throughout the world. At this point she finally gets it. She goes back to the symbolic scene as her older sister Lorina reads the final paragraph from the Wonderland book, the one in which Dodgson reveals the reason he made up the story. Then the child Alice walks over, kisses Dodgson in apology, and places her head on his chest (an omission for which she has long felt guilty). Then we are back in the hall and find that in place of her prepared speech she has read this same passage to the now applauding crowd.
The point is that she finally understood that the story was a gift to her and to future generations of children, that she had inspired the story and had been the model for his heroine. With this realization came the final gift of knowing that the virtues Mr. Dodgson gave his heroine: innocence, courage, curiosity, wonder, kindness, intelligence, courtesy, humor, dignity, and a sense of justice; were virtues he credited to the real Alice.
It is hard to imagine a better scene (or sequence of scenes) than the climatic one detailed above. Film and video cannot hope to compete with books in communicating thoughts. But with the right players film can visually communicate moments of character realization and transformation to a degree much more subtle and personal than what any author can write. This is the real magic of film and acting for the camera. In the end these climatic moments say everything that needs be said about the relationship between Dodgson and his "dreamchild". A truly great cinematic moment and my all-time favorite.
Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.
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