Musical Mondays: Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007)
Sweeney Todd, Britain’s legendary serial killer-coiffeur, became familiar to American audiences through the success of the stage musical by Steven Sondheim. Were it not for Pee-Wee and Ed Wood, would serious film lovers still be talking about backlot butcher Tim Burton? Short of Gus Van Sant’s Psycho(tic) Xerox of Hitchcock, have there been worse remakes than Burton’s alternate takes on Planet of the Apes, Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory or — forgive me — Dumbo? Johnny Depp as Sweeney and Helena Bonham Carter as his human-serving cook Mrs. Lovett are exceptional together. But in the service of what? Canned musical theatre? Both know how to hit their marks, but the real star of the show is production designer Dante Ferretti. Burton, a frustrated art director at heart, at least has the good sense to hire the best in the business. — Scott Marks