Alice is being forced to marry someone she hardly knows and for whom she does not care. Her sister is married to a philanderer, her would-be mother-in-law is a heartless control freak and her busybody peers insist she must accept the surprise marriage proposal because of the potential groom's political station.
All of this pressure causes Alice to bolt and follow the white rabbit down the rabbit hole leading to Underland, an alternate world she has visited before as a child and referred to as "Wonderland". Upon her return to Underland, she is quickly informed of a prophesy controlling her every action. She rebels again and decides to choose her own path -- all while thinking she is simply dreaming.
The movie is a masterful compilation of the classic Lewis Carroll tales Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Through the Looking-Glass, The Hunting of the Snark, and Jabberwocky. While Carroll's writings are hailed as prime examples of "literary nonsense", this film makes perfect sense. Example after example of the happiness associated with Choice and the misery accompanying Control. The Red Queen laments several times "It is better to be feared than loved."
With the background of economic distress, it is interesting that Disney Studios would produce such a forceful Choice vs. Control project as the Conservatives and Progressives battle to the death over the ideas of free will and limited government vs. supreme central control. Perhaps 150 years from now Wikipedia will characterize this debate as "political nonsense".
