Monday, December 31, 2007

Sweeney Todd: There Was A Barber and His Wife

The film features Johny Depp(Sweeney Todd), Helana Bonham Carter(Mrs.Lovett), Alan Rickman(Judge Turpin), Timothy Spall(Beadle Bamford), and Jamie Campbell Bower(Anthony Hope). John Logan and Steven Sondheim wrote the film. Tim Burton(Batman, Sleepy Hollow, Planet of The Apes) directed, and John Logan, Laurie Macdonald, Walter F. Parkes, Richard D. Zanuck produced the film. Four Golden Globes nominations has been credited to the film(IMDb). Rated-R.

Sweeney Todd, formerly known as Benjamin Parker is accompanied by Anthony Hope on a ship steadily approaching the port of London. A disenchanted man, Todd expresses his disgust for people while conversing with Hope. Both men continue to speak briefly after reaching London, then part ways. As Tod makes his way Trough the streets of London, he encounters Mrs. Lovett, and she treats him to one her disgusting meat-pies. Later, the two develop an arrangement bonded by mutual mayhem, which becomes the avenue Sweeney Todd travels as he seeks vengeance on Judge Turpin.

The somber tone of the film was galvanized by the production. Colorless and mildew like, London was crafted as if a city to lure goths searching for real estate. The contrived darkness of London's architecture corresponded well with the sociopathology of Sweeney Todd, Mrs.Lovett and Judge Turpin. Retardation of the conscience painted the hearts of these three characters black, and noticeably, there is very little color in the film with the exception of certain scenes such as when Todd remembers his past, and when Mrs. Lovett is trying to hint or confess her feelings to Todd. With the production matching the dark tendencies of some of the major characters, one appreciates the disconsolate feelings experienced while watching the film. The on-screen milieu is not evidently jovial but morose, and while watching the film one's dark side may experience a gothic orgasm. The point is, the characters are just as dark as their surroundings, and a major explanatory aid of the dreadful state of the characters' affairs was the production.

Sweeney Todd carries a face countenanced with stoic death. A death existing as the side-effect of a blissful life lost. His stoicism communicates callousness belonging to the genre of those cursed with malformed empathy. Todd's stoicism is at times interrupted by anger when he senses his quest for vengeance is being encroached by the faults of others. His former self Benjamin Parker, seems to appear only when memories of a blissful past grants him resurrection from beneath the surface of Sweeney Todd's pale deathly countenance. Repugnant morally indeed, but one can understand why Sweeney Todd was born and why Benjamin Parker died. After experiencing such a loss many may believe vengeance is the only form of justice that will compensate for the breadth of such loss, and Benjamin Parkers transformation into Sweeney Todd may seem natural. As pathological as Sweeney Todd may be, movie-watchers were probably supporting Sweeney Todd's quest for vengeance.

The singing, oh damn the singing! as I watched this movie I developed a "Fuck", and the singing managed to annoy it out of me. If the script was modified to have less singing, joy to the world. The person's singing that annoyed me the most was Jamie Campbell Bower(Anthony Hope), " I feel you Johanna", aaaaaargh. Complaints aside, the film was a musical and the singing did not take away from richness of the story. This was a great film.







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