Better on second viewing!

Rating: 8/10 (1 June 2012)

I watched this movie on opening weekend and thought the design was amazing as always for a Tim Burton movie. Johnny Depp was amazing as a vampire, as expected. These two have a chemistry and their own visual and theatrical vocabulary that they have cultivated over the many projects they have worked on together. The other actors were also well cast and believable. But on the first viewing I was sort of let down by the ending and by the general tone of the film. It seemed to be too light as compared to the bits and pieces I remember glimpsing on daytime TV when it was in reruns in the early 80s. My mother loved the show when it originally aired so Dark Shadows was a reference that has seemed to be floating around my whole life. So although I enjoyed it the first time, I tended to agree with the reviewers that said something was missing.
However, I went to see it again as a matinée midweek recently and my experience was much different. (It is a great matinée film...with these great dramatic monster and maiden hero shots at the beginning and end.) In the interim, I had watched almost every episode of the old show that has been uploaded on Netflix and so this time I could appreciate all the analogs from the show to the movie...and this made all the difference! Because the fact is that it's all there from the original, just reflected or refracted through the mind of Tim Burton and Johnny Depp. And on seeing it the second time, I think it really works! Rather than being a remake or a homage, it is its own entity but with all the characters and places referenced in some ways and changed in others to fit the story. Now, some purists who only want the Dan Curtis version will never like this movie. But I say give it a second chance if you felt so-so after the first viewing. We have the original, melodramatic version which is brilliant and now we have this movie, which is another take that in time will be viewed as brilliant in its own right. In watching the old show, there is a mounting frustration in myself as a person of the 21st century that screams out to Barnabas to just reveal himself for what he is and let others deal with it. Most of his problems come from trying to hide who he is from everyone. Burton must have felt this too, especially given his filmic crusade to liberate and celebrate the "others" of our society, because the Barnabas in this movie is a vampire, accepts it and gets on with life. This joie de vie for being undead gives Depp's Barnabas a great energy and makes this movie a fun ride that I will no doubt watch many more times once I have the DVD. I even found the ending more acceptable the second time. I guess just as with all Burton films, this one too will fit better with wear.