Steal hearts with Alice in Wonderland's Red Queen merchandise

Off with their heads!

Tim Burton’s re-imagining of Alice in Wonderland is like no other we’ve seen before, yet it conveys all the strange and mad things we know and love from the story. Using new animation and 3D techniques along with his twisted and kooky imagination, he’s managed to give Wonderland the gothic fantasy makeover. When asked why he chose to take on the project he said: "I just loved the trippiness of the story. There’s been over 20-some versions of it and it is so much a part of our culture, through music and bands and other artists’ interpretations, but for me, it felt like it was open territory because there hasn’t really been a definitive version.” And we wouldn’t expect a quirky Burton tale to be complete without his sidekicks – Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter. As Johnny takes on the role of the Mad Hatter, Helena portrays the violent and stubborn Red Queen.

Alice in Wonderland marks the sixth film real life partners Tim and Helena have worked on, starting out with Planet of the Apes and covering everything from The Corpse Bride to Sweeney Todd in-between. Helena is no newcomer to creepy characters, being well known for her portrayal of Marla Singer in Fight Club and as the terrifying Bellatrix Lestrange in the Harry Potter films.

So playing the quirky queen with a huge head must have been easy for her – especially since she took inspiration from her and Tims’ daughter: “I thought: well, she’s a toddler, because she’s got the big head. She’s a tyrant … toddlers are tyrants. The ‘no sympathy for any other living creature’ – that’s our toddler, in fact. There’s no empathy, just commands. She just bosses us around – dictatorship. No please, no thank you. ‘Mummy come here’, ‘Mummy go’, ‘Mummy! Watch telly’. And another toddler quality – it’s all about me, it’s all about her, never considers us: ask, ask, ask. So the toddler thing was a big inspiration.”

And when it comes to Tim’s view on the character, he says he based it partly on his mother and the tax-evading, billionaire ‘Queen of Mean’, Leona Helmsley. But neither of them is the inspiration for the huge head, which came from many different sources: "In lots of illustrations and incarnations of Carroll’s work through the years, it always seems like she had a big head. It was an interesting challenge for us to find the right size and weight and proportions.”

But it’s not just the huge head that gives the Red Queen her trademark look, but two and a half hours in the make-up chair every day. To achieve it, Helena said she had to: “put a bald cap on and get rid of my hairline then have to paint it and put my beauty make-up on, that took some time, then my huge wig.” The make-up is certainly elaborate; a totally white face with high eye brows, bright blue eyeshadow and heart shaped lips painted on. Add to that the black, gold and red Edwardian style dress covered in hearts and a tiny gold crown and the effect is amazing.

To celebrate the release of the movie and Helena’s strangely beautiful (and scary) Red Queen we’ve found some of the coolest merchandise online. Whether you want a cool tee, some gorgeous Tom Binns Disney Couture jewellery or something a bit stranger we’ve got it.