The WHOLE musical shebang!

Rating: 8/10 (4 July 2014)

This movie is my absolute favorite musical in all time for 3 reasons: I have a deep lying infatuation with the entirety of Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham-Carter's character dept. Neither leave me disappointed and without seeing actual pictures of them outside of film, I cannot imagine what they would look like outside of costume. The many faces of Johnny Depp remind me of a Count Olaf (from Lemony Snickette's: A series of Unfortunate Events) with actual talent and intelligent adults. Tim Burton has an amazing way of mixing my 2 favorite movie genres; animation and horror/thriller. His way of combining elements and twisting something dark and cynical into something dark and whimsical, while conversely making the light and whimsical light and demented intrigues and aids in perceiving the darker/lighter side of a situation. I love musicals. I do not, however, love movies that claim to be a musical and simply have musical numbers here and there as an aside. In many "musicals" you can skip over the singing and still follow the entire plot of the story without a single pause. In TRUE musicals (except the dreadfully overly musical, like Les Mis') the song is the dialogue and a full conversation between the character and themselves, two characters, or the entire cast at the time. The music of Sweeney Todd plays as full dialogue that shouldn't be missed and helps to further develop the characters. For instance, how else should they show that Sweeney had completely lost it than having him fantasize and sing to many citizens of London while another person consciously watched him unravel? And the music behind the lyrics expressed each individual character to aid in the plot development...that is a true musical. The music isn't simply an accessory or some paint to tickle your fancy, but a functioning element ensuring that the machine run smoothly.