Normally we don’t go for direct press puffery here at STS – prefering to think our journalistic integrity is worth a pint or two at least – but the 25th of February sees the premiere of Tim Burton’s Alice In Wonderland, and we’re willing to make an exception as the 3D extravaganza and the nice chaps from Disney will be transforming London’s Leicester Square for the event in aid of The Prince’s Foundation for Children & the Arts

The entire cast—including Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter, Anne Hathaway as the White Queen and newcomer Mia Wasikowska as Alice will be attending, and hopefully we’ll be able to distinguish Tim burton and Helena Bonham-Carter from the drunks stumbling out of Chinatown as the entire place gets it’s bi-annual scrub down in preperation for a royal visit (that’s HRH The Prince of Wales, not Stephen Fry).

We’ve already seen some pretty stunning visuals – including the (did we mention it was exclusive? we probably should) new image of Anne Hathawy above – from the movie, as Alice “embarks on a fantastical journey to find her true destiny and end the Red Queen’s reign of terror” apparently. Oh -and it’s in lovely 3D – not sure how that works with the Cheshire Cat but hey-ho.

Alice in Wonderland is released across the UK on March the 5th on 2D, Disney Digital 3D and IMAX® 3D screens, so come on down and join in as we attempt to sneak past the bouncers and cram your camera full of celebrity goodness in aid of a good cause.

What with Monday’s anouncement that Pirates of the Caribbean 4: On Stranger Tides will begin filming soon in Hawaii, you might think that the mass of Depp hitting our screens is about to reach critical mass. It seems Disney are betting against it though-which is why they were nice enough to furnish us with some lovely new stills from Tim Burton’s sure-to-be-massive Alice In Wonderland. Check out the Deppster in all his ginger glory above , and read on for an exclusive mini podcast with some sneak plot details, and yet more wonderful imagery -including a pic of Alice that caused several innapropriate outbursts among the STS staff. Whatever reception the movie receives, there’s no denying it’ll be beautiful to watch…

Check out our exclusive Character Gallery below:

Time to chuck that moldering Jack Sparrow costume out the window and get yourself an outsize topper for next Halloween, as our driends at Disey reveal the new trailer for Tim Burton’s hotly tipped Alice In Wonderland today.

Previously the STS staff only got near a set of playing cards when payday rolled around, but based on this they’re all set to be next years must-have fashion accesory. Expect Burton regulars Depp and Bonham Carter to be suitably nutty and degenerate, with Burton’s dark edge seemingly finding it’s spritual home as some wonderfully twisted takes on the classic Lewis Carrol characters lurk among the beautifully rendered backgrounds.

Whether it’s a big hitter or a Mad Hatter may be down to the script, but based on this it’ll be a sight worth seeing…

Adapted from Shane Acker’s own 2005 Oscar-nominated animated short, 9 is a weighty slab of CG sci fi that owes more to Alexander Reynolds than Pixar, bright colours and loveable characters replaced with grim, menacing situations and a serious lack of laughs. Indeed, it even seems dark for producer Tim Burton; stripped of the dry, moribund humour that characterised Batman and particularly Beetlejuce, this is very much Acker’s baby, and a very unhappy one at that.

Given Burton’s involvement and some heavyweight distribution, 9 will certainly play to filled cinemas initially, but it’s gloom may make it unsuitable for either younger children or the stripy-socked post-goths that usually lap up Burton’s output. Here the post-apocalyptic, and post-modern thematics will more readily appeal to fans of underground comics and hard sci-fi, with the original 11 minute tale of ragdolls battling a mechanical and metaphysical enemy thoroughly expanded and retconned to incorporate some intriguing and excellent Vancian bleakness.

Granting the previously mute dolls speech, and positioning them as the inheritors of an Earth ruined by humanity, The story plays out in a devastated, but identifiably European city lending a post-war gravity to proceedings that adds to the grimness.

9 himself is a Pinnochio proxy in a world where there are no ‘real boys’ to aspire to, only a dead Gepetto figure in the dusty, ruined apartment where he first awakens. Immediately attacked by a menacing, robotic canine, Martin Landau’s 2 comes to his rescue, only to sacrifice himself in the process; carried away to a menacing industrial site, one of the few structures left standing. 9 quickly finds others like himself – John C. Reilly’s Cyclopean 5 taking him to meet 1, the first of their kind. Cautious and wise, Christopher Plummer’s dusty tones mean 1 is a standout in an unfortunately underused ensemble task of great talent. Crispin Glover in particular gives real pathos to the demented 6, but like Elijah Wood’s emotive hero, he’s often given little to do and struggles to bring real empathy to the character despite impressive work when given the opportunity.

Ignoring 1’s wishes, the dolls set out to rescue 2, encountering Jennifer Connelly’s spirited 7 along the way, and accidentally alerting the mechanical, soul sucking villain to their existence.

While slightly thin on characterisation, the film is never the less highly engaging, with some beautiful and singular CGI work bringing to life a world both gritty and genuinely dangerous, while the running time is wisely kept short enough to excuse this lack of emotional resonance, the film setting itself up instead as a cautionary parable, our Stichpunk hero’s cyphers for various aspects of humanity.

While it’s occasionally cold, it’s a unique vision that deserves respect for taking CGI animation down a darker and more serious path than usual and hopefully opening the medium up to further experimental tinkering in the near future. As befits a movie about patchwork characters, it’s not entirely successful, but it’s certainly more than the sum of it’s parts and it will be criminal if it doesn’t garner serious interest come awards season.

Learn more about the movie here.

Those of you on the cutting edge of Steampunk – or indeed, those of you who enjoy post-apocalyptic children’s films produced by Tim Burton – will surely be looking forward to Shane Acker’s upcoming full length version of his award winning short 9, seen above.

Following the adventures of the eponymous rag doll as he tries to find his comrades, and put a stop to the evil, mechanical fabricator that’s wiped out most of life on Earth, it promises to be a visually stunning experience with a plot dark and twisting enough to ensnare anyone who sees it.

As you can guess, STS isn’t the only site looking forward to this; but we are one of a very select group with access to all sorts of goodies related to the movie, and maybe, just maybe, you can get your hands on some of them too!

Over the next few days, we’ll be posting a series of articles about the movie, including exclusive footage and an interview with lead voice and well known Hobbit Elijah Wood!

And that’s not all…

Courtesy of the genrous folks at Way To Blue and Focus Features, we’ll have some exclusive prizes and an internet-wide treasure hunt almost as difficult as 9’s own quest. Want to join in? Well, let’s start you off – we’re the first of a group involved in this project : Can you track down the others 8?

The numbers are out there – so go hunt them down!

Sprout-faced heartthrob Leonardo DiCaprio is taking a page out of Tim Burtons Big Book of Kooky, and targeting the lucrative “Teenage-girl-with-stripy-socks-on-hands” market with a big budget version of ‘Little Red Riding Hood’ next on the slate for Appian Way Productions.

This version will of course be:

A Dark, Gothic take on the well loved fairy tale

So full points for originality there –although how a menstruation parable featuring a cross-dressing lycanthrope and a hero with a massive chopper could possibly be given a dark edge is beyond me.

Orphan writer David Leslie Johnson is scripting, so expect crap twists a-plenty throughout.

Confirmed goth, Tim Burton has long tried to craft a reputation for ghoulish, fantastical work, and seems to be succeeding in securing larger and larger budgets despite his movies only appealing to teenage girls with blue hair and socks on their hands.

While USA Today has called the concept art for his latest reimagining (read: no original material) Alice In Wonderland proof that Burton is ‘attuned to the fantastic’, the concept art released today is certainly pretty, but it seems like we’re in for another helping of style over substance.

All the usual suspects line up for the advance posters, Depp as the mad hatter, Big-Bonced Bonham Carter as the red queen and, natch, Christopher Lee lurking in the background.

On the plus side, there is relative newcomer Mia Wasikowska in the title role, although it’s hard to shake the feeling that a passing resemblance to Winona may have helped her audition along. Still, she’s been pretty solid in HBO’s Treatment, so here’s hoping she can keep the film grounded in reality and prevent too much kooky, ooky, Burtonization from sucking all the tension and drama out in favour of Chitty Bang Bang cutesyness.

Check out the full interactive images courtesy of USA Today.