Sweeney Todd is Bloody Good!- Page 2

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 12:38am

The inclusion of BY THE SEA is important only because it perfectly shows Lovett's vision of their future. It would have been impossible to show it any other way, but I do think that the WAY it was included was a bit...silly and odd.

I understand that Burton wanted to focus on Lovett/Sweeney, but the EXclusion of "Kiss Me" makes everything else seem less important.

[SueleenGay]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 12:48am

Well, they have to save SOMETHING for the DVD!

[artscallion]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 8:36am

The Johanna/Anthony story is silly even in the stage version. They're caricatures of the brave sailor hero and the damsel in distress, used solely as plot devices. I mean really, they're engaged before she even knows his name. KISS ME establishes that silliness. It doesn't add to or flesh out their relationship. In fact, KISS ME may have been left out exactly because, in a more literal movie world, it makes them look even more silly.

Having said that, with a more literal minded movie movie audience, I think the lack of focus on Johanna/Anthony does present a problem. Two non-musical loving friends each independently emailed me after seeing it yesterday to ask if "you find out what happens to Johanna in the stage version" That was their first and only question about the movie (which they both loved, BTW)

I do think, in a movie, that it's sketchy to present a character so regularly in peril and then not resolve that character's story a little more concretely and fully.

[Glebb]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 9:49am

I'm with you on this artscallion.
It's similar to how 'The Germans At The Spa' which was so good in the original NINE would just not have worked in the Leveaux version.
I was expecting to see even a ghostly shadow of Joanna and Athony on a ship at the end and was disturbed not to. But of course because I was all gushy I forgave Burton right away.

[Auggie27]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 10:32am

I'm going this afternoon, but I'm reminded of the release of CABARET. Those of us who had been in love with the stage show at the end of the 60s were stunned by the elimination of the memorable Fraulein Schneider/Herr Shultz material -- and the addition of the Berenson character - and for a while, I couldn't get over it, the Lotte Lenya characterization so potent a connect to Weill-era musical theater, et. etc. I actually felt Fosse had made it an "un-musical." Years later, watching the film, I never even think of it, even after the Roundabout revival. It's a stand-alone achievement, perhaps ahead of its time. Perhaps the omissions in SWEENEY -- far less severe, the film clearly more faithful on every level -- will have the same long run profile. Can't wait to go.

By the way -- how is the sound? I remember DREAMGIRLS taking the roof off the Ziegfeld, rather like the ROSE had 30 years ago. And then HAIRSPRAY came out and sounded like a 1950's presentation without sterero. My first viewing of SWEENEY cannot be at the Ziegfeld, so I'm worried.

[Glebb]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 10:40am

Wow, the sound for VICTOR/VICTORIA was fabulous at The Ziegfeld. It was so much fun and there was thunderous applause after Le Jazz Hot.

Sweeney was pumped way good here in Salt Lake City.

[Auggie27]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 10:47am

(I remember applause for Le Jazz Hot at the Ziegfeld, too, Glebb. Maybe we were there the same day?!)

[Glebb]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 10:49am

Quite possible Auggie.
There were a lot of us in the audience. :)

[SueleenGay]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 11:28am

I saw Sweeney at the same multiplex where I saw Dramgirls and although I don't know if each individual theatre has the same system installed, the sound for Sweeney was fabulous. I was extremely disappointed in the Dreamgirls sound. I wanted to yell, "Crank it UP...to 11!"

[nitsua]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 12:54pm

I had no problem with the sound at the Palms, but they boast a state-of-the art sound system.

I'm really hoping the DVD has a lot of cut scenes.

[D2]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 12:57pm

Auggie, the sound at the Ziegfeld is indeed "blow the roof off."

[TheatreDiva90016]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 1:06pm

Thank God I have the Archlight theatre!

Everything sounds great there!

[SueleenGay]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 1:22pm

I don't care how good the sound system is, Helena Bonham Carter will not sound great.

[nitsua]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 1:27pm

I thought she was brilliant. She was Mrs Lovett the whole way through.
What'd you expect?
Here's this old widow who's been selling meat pies her whole life. She wouldn't have a perfect voice.
Sometimes you have to sacrifice a good voice for a great character.

[roquat]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 7:00pm

SPOILERS*********************************************************

Actually I missed the Beggar Woman material more than Johanna and Anthony's material. Her appearances are so brief and bewildering I'm sure that moviegoers unfamiliar with the show were just confused. And she isn't allowed any of her sexy, vulgar business; she just steps in and out to drop exposition. There's no intrigue, no mysterious sense that this character is important in any way--and I'm not even sure her identity was clearly established at the end (it's a MOVIE--couldn't they have slipped in a little flashback insert while Depp was crying over her, just to remind us?)

That said, I also think the handling of Johanna's fate at the end is LUDICROUS.

[Auggie27]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 7:29pm

I just returned from it, and I was too swept away by its wedding of imagery and music to consider the omissions and dilutions for an hour afterward. What a startup! Burton has managed to make the first 30 minutes so active, so alive, and even so musically rich, that we are grabbed by the throat, and invested, maybe even more than in the theater. And I've seen it countless times on stage, the original, the "teenie", the city opera, and the Doyle. I didn't feel any let-up or lessening of his control over the material until the Perelli sequence (which is a bit of a slow-down, and had a curious drop in volume, before it pumped up again.) And then Burton managed to make the "epiphany" sequence and then the "Johanna" act two montage literally breathtaking. The combination of the lush arrangements, performed by an orchestra twice the size of the original b'way pit band, creates an overwhelming aural feast for fans of the score, particularly "The Ballad..." We get such a total immersion in Sondheim's "wall of sound," with some stunning visuals.

Much has been made of the violence, but it's very, very stylized, with Hammer film excess so that it plays with some of the sytlization of the stage show, admittedly with a different visual vocabulary. The blood didn't bother me, not once. But one death in the final sequence had a truly disturbing visual that haunts me. When I see the film again, I will shut my eyes. Those who've seen it know; those who haven't but know the stage show can guess. It's almost obligatory, but it's terrifying and almost tragic. Funny, he got us used to the spurting blood, and then knocked the wind out of us once the blood-letting was almost over.


SPOILERS

And yet, yes, I, too, had a few bones to pick. All the same Beggar Woman issues I feel in hindsight (though curiously, not watching it). And Ms. B-Carter's work, while all of a piece, and on its own terms, bold and devoid of camp or artifice, has occasional drawbacks, with so many lines chewed up. Her songs land beautifully, especially "Wait" and her portions of "Priest." But Burton put such reality-obsessed handcuffs on her, her underplayed dialogue too often cannot be understood or fully appreciated. Because the character's drained emotional center has been conceived and executed with a subtlety that offers its own rewards, it's not a serous loss. But sometimes the zombie line readings just disappear on delivery.

And yes, I missed "Kiss Me." I expected to, and then almost forget about it until we got to "Ladies in their..." and then I knew it wasn't coming. And I still miss it, having seen the affecting J and A, who I believe would've made a persuasive case for its inclusion. Believe me, we never forget Mr. Depp's Sweeney, and a few minutes away from him wouldn't have put air in. But it's a minor gripe; I simply adore the quartet, and therefore remain biased.

My bottom line is basically like the majority at this board: The achievement here is too major, the translation from stage to screen too accomplished, too sensitive and appreciative of the Wheeler/Sondheim (and Prince) creation, for me to want to nitpick. Burton managed to make the film of this show many of us would've dreamed of 25 years ago, but considered impossible. I think it's a kind of gold standard, and may we all pray it works its magic sufficiently to promise more where this came from.

Updated On: 12/22/07 at 07:29 PM

[Glebb]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 7:34pm

Oh thank you Auggie.
I fondly loved your review of this masterpiece.

For those who would criticize, what do you want, blood?

[chris d]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 7:44pm

anyone else find Depp's rendition of "My Friends" as peculiarly erotic??

[Glebb]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 7:58pm

Every bloomin frame!

[Auggie27]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 8:19pm

And speaking of subtext, what about Sweeney's approach to the Beadle? I thought he hustled him big time, all that promise of special treatment in his chair. Timothy Spall clearly made a choice when his eyes lit up. We got insight into The Beadle heretofore unexplored.

[SueleenGay]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 8:30pm

Always interested in your views, Auggie. The main problem I had with HBC's performance, as I said before, is it is not very volitional. There is no drive. And although she did not ruin the film for me, I wish it had just a touch more Lady Macbeth with a lot of Marni Nixon mixed in.

[Auggie27]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 8:44pm

Sueleen, she does play a subtext of something akin to "defeat" -- a sort of waiting-to-die angle that was never, ever in the original. The first Sondheim/Wheeler/Prince/Lansbury Lovett was a primo survivor, someone who'd land on her feet. She not only loved Sweeney, he was her way out of a life of struggle The Burton take doesn't ignore the improved business angle, and class-vaulting leaps, but it doesn't mine it, or illuminate how critical that is to Lovett's MO. She turns people into meat pies not only because it helps her codependency to this damanged soul, but because it allows her to have better staples in her equivalent of a walk-in refrigerator. Cheap meat, better pies, better biz. That's not missing, but it's in the background here, isn't it? She's a shrewd business woman -- dare I say, there's a Martha Stewart angle to this lady? I do believe that's missing, and though her love for Sweeney is a terrific motivator, and more first tier, I miss her vaulting ambition.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 9:33pm

I agree with both Auggie and Sueleen on the matter of Helena.

I appreciated her insight (as detailed in Auggie's post) but I do wish that she did a bit more for her songs. I didn't mind her voice, but they could have AT LEAST made it louder than the orchestra. I know all of the words, and there were still times when I found myself saying "Now, what line did she just swallow?"

[ljay889]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 9:39pm

I don't think there's ever been a Lovett (at least outside of the opera world) that sang with PERFECT diction. I've had problems understanding lyrics sung by Lansbury and LuPone also. I think a lot of that is because of Sondheim's very tricky rhythms.
Updated On: 12/22/07 at 09:39 PM

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 12/22/07 at 9:52pm

But in this case it wasn't diction, it was volume.