Review of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007) by Johnb. — 01 Jan 2008

I'm not much of a fan of musicals. Sitting through things like "The Sound of Music" is sheer torture for me. I was intrigued with the overall plot of Sweeney Todd, but I still had misgivings about the fact that it is still a musical.

As it turns out, seeing this movie was a superb, if uneasy, experience. This is a dark, dark, sardonic movie, with unexpected comic turns. The dreariness of the cinematagraphy is almost numbing, and yet it mostly works given the plot.

Depp is astounding in the lead. I saw the movie without any baggage from having seen any previous Broadway versions, and so I am judging the movie on its own merits rather than by comparison. Much of the music does seem to have a rather dated quality to it, which doesn't mean that it's not good.

It just took me a while to be immersed in it, and before too long I was able to enjoy it about as much as most contemporary music that I like. The lyrics, in a number of instances, are just brilliantly, comically vicious.

In a world in which people are routinely devouring each other, why not do it right and make folks into delicious pies. The idea rings even truer now than decades ago when this musical first hit Broadway.

It's a positively Swiftian premise. I heartily recommend this movie for people who can stomach it. The gore, the cutting, the dumping of the bodies with a sickening thud 15 or so feet below Sweeney's establishment - not for the squeamish.

But if you are the kind of person who finds a perverse delight in hearing lyrics like, "We all deserve to die," then this is a movie event you should not miss.