A Bloody Mess

Rating: 1/10 (24 December 2007)

I love "Sweeney Todd" the Broadway show. But what a relentless, grim, slog this movie is.
Where to begin? Johnny Depp looks like Cruella De Ville, and sings like David Bowie. He is completely miscast. An overrated actor if there ever was one. Helena Bohnam Carter fares slightly better, but can barely carry a tune. Both look too young for their roles.
Many scenes contain whispered or otherwise unintelligible dialogue. Other scenes are terribly under lit.
The movie has no tempo, no shape. The pacing is leaden. The staging is pedestrian, even during the musical numbers. You keep waiting for them to take off, but they just plod along to their lead footed conclusion.
By stripping out half the score, Burton has taken away the context, the irony, and the dark humor of the Broadway show. What we are left with is a docu-psycho-drama...with music! In the Broadway show, Sweeney gets up off the floor at the end and admonishes the audience to "attend" his tale. In the movie, there is no such relief. All we are left with is a perverse, depressing, bloody pieta...fade to black.
Oh, and the blood---! It's horrific, and no amount of apologizing or explaining on behalf of the production team can excuse it. This is beyond "over-the-top," it's gratuitous, even pornographic. Only for the very strongest of stomachs.
The audience I saw the movie with greeted the credits in absolute silence. Then we all glumly shuffled out of the theater, feeling like we needed a shower.
Who is this movie for? People who like musicals will hate the blood. People who like slasher flicks will hate the music. People who like Sondheim will hate the reduced score and the inadequate singing voices. And the teeny boppers who like Johnny Depp will be traumatized for life.
It's a movie for nobody. Stay away. Rent the DVD of the Broadway show.