Movie Review - 'Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street'

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

Starring Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter and Alan Rickman
Directed by Tim Burton
Rated R

The combination of director Tim Burton and actor Johnny Depp has forged some of modern cinema's most peculiar creations, from the eternally optimistic schlock filmmaker Ed Wood to the fragile boy with weapons as hands that keep love away from him in Edward Scissorhands. but even when the characters aren't named Edward, Depp is given more free reign over them with Burton than any other director, and for his part, Burton has the complete trust of his actor.

It's rare that it happens, and rarer still when both artists are near the top of the mountain in their respective fields.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street finds them again mining a memorable character and a bizarre looking film experience, but it's one that becomes dreary and almost monotonous without ever truly finding its way back out of the mire. Based on the Stephen Sondheim musical about a vengeful barber's quest for blood and the industrious downstairs neighbor (Helena Bonham Carter) who uses his victims as the main course in her restaurant), Sweeney Todd is not the happiest bit of musical theater you'll ever find. It's also not the easiest to hum along with.

In fact, the songs work better on stage than on film, but that's hardly a criticism of Burton's production. The criticism is how those songs are used not just to help tell the story but also how they hold the story back. Depp is no great singer and neither is Bonham Carter, so the songs don't play to the actors' strengths, nor the director's.

The acting is good - again, better when the cast is reciting dialogue and not lyrics - and the production design is endlessly dark and uninviting. But Sweeney Todd is not a great film. Like the director's Sleepy Hollow, also starring Depp, it's a Burtonesque version of the story, but since it could be argued that Burton hasn't made a masterpiece in a good fifteen years, what exactly does that mean?

In this case, it means a film that sounds ominous, looks like a bad dream, couldn't have been made by anyone else, and ultimately, just falls short of greatness.