Dreamchild

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Dreamchild is a 1985 drama film produced by Verity Lambert directed by Gavin Millar and written by Dennis Potter. It stars Coral Browne, Ian Holm, Peter Gallagher, Nicola Cowper and Amelia Shankley. A fictionalized account of Alice Liddell, the child who inspired Lewis Carroll's famous Alice in Wonderland stories. The story is told from the point of view of the elderly Alice Hargreaves (nee Liddell) as she travels to the United States from England to receive an honorary degree from Columbia University celebrating the centenary of Lewis Carroll's birth.

The film evolves from the factual to the hallucinatory as Alice revisits her memories of the Reverend Charles Dodgson (Holm), in Victorian-era Oxford to her immediate present in the unruly wonderland of Depression-era New York.

Accompanied by a young orphan Lucy (Cowper), old Alice must navigate her way through the modern world of tabloid journalism and commercial exploitation and come to peace with her conflicted childhood with the whimsical and repressed Oxford don whose deep affection for her produced one of the most beloved classics of children's literature.

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[edit] Storyline

The movie begins on the ship bearing Alice and Lucy, from England to New York. As she and Lucy disembark, they are set upon by legions of journalists, all trying to get a story or quote from her. Clearly bewildered by all the excitement, she is befriended by an ex-reporter, Jack Dolan (Gallagher), who helps her and Lucy through the legions of the press. Dolan quickly becomes her agent and finds endorsement opportunities for her. Throughout it all, a romance develops between Jack and Lucy.

But all is not well with Alice. Being so advanced in age, she needs Lucy to be her constant companion. When left alone in their hotel room, she begins to hallucinate and sees Mr. Dodgson in their room and then, later, the Mad Hatter and March Hare. Joining them for their insane tea party, they berate her for being so old and forgetful.

Via flashbacks, it is insinuated that Dodgson had an infatuation with the young Alice Liddell. Was it an innocent admiration he had for the girl or something inappropriate? Alice is clearly troubled by her recollections of Dodgson. The parameters of her relationship with him were somewhat tortured. Dodgson was unwaveringly adoring of Alice, and while she was usually kind, she could sometimes be cruel and mocking of him, especially of his occasional stutter. Alice tries to rectify her feelings and past relationship with the author in her mind.

By the time she delivers her acceptance speech at Columbia University, she comes to terms with Dodgson and the way she treated him. In another fantasy sequence with the Mock Turtle, the viewers see them finally reconciled together in a way that can be interpreted as all-encompassing, as both mutual apology and forgiveness.

[edit] Trivia

  • The film's score was composed by Stanley Myer who went on to compose the score for another fairytale-themed film, The Witches.
  • The Chinese costume sequence in the film depicting Dodgson taking Alice's portrait at Oxford is based on actual photographs he took of her and her sisters. Dodgson, an early pioneer of photography, was considered one of the world's first photographic portraitists.
  • The Depression-era setting of the film in 1934, when Alice turned 80 was also the same year she died.

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Lewis Carroll's Alice
Books
Alice in Wonderland Characters
Through the Looking-Glass Characters
Film adaptations
Poems
Related topics