By Ryan Parsons | Image property of Paramount Pictures.
Sweeney Todd
Ever since the first poster for Sweeney Todd I was hooked. Hoping for the best, the early hype was confirmed by early screening reports. The film was good, but how good? Way ahead of schedule, we have been alerted to some of the first official reviews for the film.
Official Reviews for Sweeney Todd
So far so good! The reviews for Sweeney Todd are not only positive, but they give credit to the film for pulling off what looked to be an impossible adaptation.
Variety
Both sharp and fleet, “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street” proves a satisfying screen version of Stephen Sondheim’s landmark 1979 theatrical musical. Where much could have gone wrong, things have turned out uniformly right thanks to highly focused direction by Tim Burton, expert screw-tightening by scenarist John Logan, and haunted and musically adept lead performances from Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter. Assembled artistic combo assures the film will reap by far the biggest audience to see a pure Sondheim musical, although just how big depends on the upscale crowd’s tolerance for buckets of blood, and the degree to which the masses stay away due to the whiff of the highbrow. In all events, DreamWorks-Paramount and Warner Bros. have a classy and reasonably commercial delicacy on their hands.
Hollywood Reporter
Stephen Sondheim's award-winning musical "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street," a savage tale of cannibalism, madness and serial murder, is now Tim Burton's "Sweeney Todd." The show couldn't have fallen into better hands. With realistic gore replacing the stylistic bloodletting in the stage version, "Sweeney" loses some of its darkly comic tone -- not a lot of laughs here except the nervous kind.
The blood juxtaposed to the music is highly unsettling. It runs contrary to expectations. Burton pushes this gore into his audiences' faces so as to feel the madness and the destructive fury of Sweeney's obsession. Teaming with Depp, his long-time alter ego, Burton makes Sweeney a smoldering dark pit of fury and hate that consumes itself. With his sturdy acting and surprisingly good voice, Depp is a Sweeney Todd for the ages.
Check out both reviews for Sweeney Todd by clicking the bold links above.
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