Movie Talks Archives

Posted by: Monotreme at February 14, 2008, 12:14 pm

Topic: Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street Forum: JoBlo

(Tim Burton, 2007) Going to the movies is almost always a gamble. Good reviews, award nominations, and impressive casts or creative teams aren't always enough. Eventually it all boils down to personal preference and taste. A viewer can be totally alienated by a critically acclaimed, award-winning opus, while at the same time fall in love with a ridiculed, derided critical bomb. But every once in a while, a film comes along that can simply do no wrong. Dangerous as it occasionally is, going in to Sweeney Todd I pretty much knew I would love it. Between it being a R-rated, serious musical, one of my favourite genres; starring two of my favourite actors Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter; and directed by my all-time favourite director Tim Burton, I was pretty certain that I would find more than enough in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street to enjoy. And was I glad to not be disappointed. The film is one of the greatest recent examples of a perfect marriage of cinematic creative team and source material. It is only fitting that Stephen Sondheim's dark, macabre, horrific musical be adapted to the screen by none other than Tim Burton, who if anything excels at the dark and the macabre. Although Burton's greatest cinematic preamble to Sweeney Todd is his equally dark and nearly equally gory Sleepy Hollow, incidentally also starring Johnny Depp, with its de-saturated colour palette and gloomy, shadowy, other-worldly atmosphere; the fact is that most of Burton's work belongs to a more childish, fantastical type of macabre. Most of his movies are rated PG, and although claiming to be a stranger to the genre, it's important to notice that some of these films also contain musical numbers. Although not directed by him, The Nightmare Before Christmas was a full-fledged musical, and the same goes for the similarly stop-animated Corpse Bride, this time directed by Burton himself. Even his Charlie and the Chocolate Factory contained a few musical numbers in the form of the Oompa Loompa songs, but one can truly look at Sweeney Todd as a confluence of many of Burton's previous themes and subjects, coming out in full force with guns blazing. At the center of the film is Stephen Sondheim's musical work, which is so intensely complex and fantastically intricate it's even more of a wonder that it all works so well. Indeed, considering the immense complexity along with the dark, serious nature of the story and the ultimate tragedy of the tale, one can liken Sondheim's work far less to the classic Broadway musical revue and more to a full-fledged modern opera. With songs featuring multiple characters singing and overlapping one another only to occasionally synchronize to incredibly complicated note transitions, recurring themes, lines and elements throughout the entire work, recurring and winding sets of rhymes and rhythms, it is indeed an epic, complicated, majestically elaborate work that deserves credit on its own. And while Sondheim's full, 3-hour musical is more than worth a viewing (or at least a listen) in order to appreciate the beauty and complexity of the entire work, Burton's film adaptation adequately and delicately condenses the musical to make it work more as a film and less as a stage show and retains the complexity and beauty of the original musical work. But this is also a Tim Burton film, and that also carries a series of characteristics and complexities unique to the director. Burton is indeed a wonder, a perfect example of a modern-day director who didn't break onto the scene through independent film but rather through the traditional studio system with which he has always managed to work with and prosper in. Burton's signature dark, macabre style comes in full force in the film in which sunlight is rarely glimpsed and the scenes are almost always drenched in a gray, de-saturated, colour-less palette – except when doused with the occasional blood splatter. Also in step with his previous works, the film retains an unreal, fantastical, otherworldly feeling to it. It is a highly stylized, darker, fantastical twist on our real-world reality, as much of Burton's films are. Frequent Burton collaborator and costume designer Colleen Atwood, along with extremely talented production designer Dante Ferretti and cinematographer Dariusz Wolski do their utmost best to evoke the dark, macabre atmosphere the film revels in. The fantasy genre is almost cheating when it comes to costume and production design, because quite literally everything goes, but I'm sure those who work in the field get the most pleasure out of projects like Sweeney Todd in which their creative minds can truly go wild and create wondrous works evoking fantastical emotions. What's for sure is that like Wes Anderson, Tim Burton's films are unmistakable and instantly recognizable based on his unique visual style alone. Burton doesn't only enjoy working with the same crew but the same cast as well. This is his sixth collaboration with Johnny Depp and his fifth with life partner Helena Bonham Carter, and the third with both of them together. It seems that Burton has found his optimal leading man and woman, his pair of muses. Indeed some of the best works from both actors are in Burton's work, and his relationship with Johnny Depp is particularly noteworthy. What is most remarkable is the transition Depp's characters have made over the years in Burton's films, and Sweeney Todd definitely serves as a first for both. From the sweet, child-like innocence and naivety of Edward Scissorhands and Ed Wood to the neurotic, blamelessness of Ichabod Crane or Victor from Corpse Bride, to the outrageously bizarre Willy Wonka. But Sweeney Todd gives us a different version of Depp; dark, sinister, still, quiet, turned inwards and blinded by rage and revenge. It is a wonderfully self-reflective, bottled-up performance and Depp truly soars with it to the heavens, just as his voice similarly soars over Sondheim's notes and lyrics. I was disappointed to learn that Depp wouldn't have any songs to sing in Corpse Bride but was ecstatic that he would get his full chance in this musical; him having been in a band I knew he could, it was just a matter of would he allow himself to. I'm certainly glad he did because the acting coupled with the singing provides for one of Depp's better performances. The equally talented Helena Bonham Carter, whom we already knew could sing from Corpse Bride, is usually regulated to brilliant supporting roles in various films which makes her leading turn in this film all the more brilliant. Burton was also blessed with a wonderful supporting cast including the always brilliantly sinister Alan Rickman (for an entirely different and perhaps even more brilliant version of Rickman, take a look at the gloriously underrated Snow Cake in which he stars alongside Sigourney Weaver), the sly Timothy Spall and the biggest surprise casting of them all, Sacha Baron Cohen as Adolfo Pirelli, a rival barber. It's great to see Cohen branching out into actual film roles as opposed to elaborate alter-egos, because the man is clearly and undeniably talented. Although his role is mostly (and brilliantly) comical, Cohen's true talent can be most plainly be seen in the one serious scene he has in the entire movie, in which he comes across as full-force menacing. It's a wonderful prelude to his starring role in the upcoming Steven Spielberg project about the Chicago 7 trials, a role which will undoubtedly propel Cohen to respect and stardom Borat could never buy him. Cast and visual style aside, the film also features the distinguishing character themes and attributes that have come to signify Burton's work, namely his protagonists' status as outcasts to society, outsiders and loners who sometimes find a companion outsider with whom they can share their pain and loneliness. The character of Sweeney Todd clearly fits Burton's outsider mold; indifferent, distant from society, a loner uninterested in social contact. Mrs. Lovett also fits the mold as the maker of the self-proclaimed worst pies in London and as the only character sympathetic to Todd's loneliness and revenge-driven plight. It is a wondrous and fulfilling experience to have your expectations met, and even exceeded. Everything was going for this film and it certainly didn't disappoint. A more than fitting addition to the Tim Burton canon, it is, on its own, a beautiful and exciting film; dramatically rewarding with its overtures of false imprisonment, evil, revenge and tragedy; its amazingly complex, operatic musical score and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim; top-notch performances from Burton's major players and a superb visual style and production value. Fans of the musical genre will rejoice to see such serious, dark, menacing subject matter getting the revue treatment – though the film knows just when to pepper itself with sly, appropriately black humour – and while those who dislike the genre may find the film's almost entirely-sung dialogue difficult to ignore, they may still find more than enough to enjoy in what is one of the most satisfying events of the year. RATING: 9/10.

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