Alice of Wonderland in Paris 1966

Young Alice, Norma MacMillan already famous for her Wonderland adventures, lies in her bedroom and drifts into a dream about visiting Paris and sharing adventures with the storybook girl Madeline. The film leaves open who this Alice is or when the story takes place, but she comes across modern touches—she even expresses affection for cheeseburgers as she contemplates the journey abroad.

Into the room rides a talking mouse named François Allen Swift who wants to conduct a cheese survey about her favorite cheeses. Eager to join him in Paris, Alice learns that he has a magic cheese, made by his own company, that uses the same enchanted mushroom she ate in Wonderland as an ingredient, and it shrinks her to the size of a rodent.

Desiring to join François in Paris, Alice discovers that the cheese enables the journey, and the two embark together on a surreal ride through the city. Together, they glide through Paris, with Allen Swift as François narrating a sequence of Parisian-themed short stories.

The dreamscape includes brief adaptations of five short stories, each reimagined with a playful twist on familiar settings and characters.

Throughout the dream, the Paris episodes include a variety of whimsical figures. In one vignette, The Frowning Prince Howard Morris appears. Other royal faces appear as well, such as Princess Lenore Trinka Snyder and the Queen Luce Ennis.

The film holds a gentle, meta-tone as it blends fantasy and dream logic, never forcing a single narrative, but instead inviting the audience to float along with François’s Parisian narration.

In the closing beat, the moment when Alice is meant to meet her story becomes a reveal: Madeline dreams of being Alice in Wonderland.

Getting to Wonderland was easy – all I had to do was fall down the rabbit hole. But let’s face it – it takes money to get to Paris!