Director: Tim Burton
Year: 2007
My Rating: **
I feel this could have been done a lot better, especially considering the team behind it. I usually adore the Burton/Depp collaborations, but this fell a little flat for me. As a fan of the actual show, I felt the film suffered from the removal of the chorus parts and felt a little too restricted in its focus on the 5 main players. While they manage to get by with the singing, what I had trouble with was the lack of passion – surprisingly, actually, since the show is inescapably ridden with festering, brooding, murderous passion. I felt Depp’s Sweeney was a little one-dimensional, never really allowing us even a glimpse of his rage as disturbingly understandable instead of purely maniacal. Alan Rickman, even with his velvet voice, was someone unbelievable in what looked like pleather pants, and Helena Bonham Carter was a tad too reminiscent of herself as Bellatrix Lestrange to suit me. That said, Sondheim's music (of course) provides a few chilling moments, and the much-talked-about blood and gore certainly deserves its notoriety. Sascha Baron Cohen was unsurprisingly good, although his cobalt blue spandex pants-suit left me thinking of the cucumber-in-the-airport scene out of Spinal Tap… perhaps to his credit?
Mr. Cohen’s pants and their contents aside, on the whole I just kind of expected a little more.
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