"You know that a movie wows an audience when nobody stirs during the closing credits. That's what happened at the end of Sweeney Todd tonight at the first critics' screening in Manhattan." So reports Tom O'Neil in his LATimes.com blog, Gold Derby. While he's not yet able to give a full review of the movie this far in advance of its December 21 release, he does have a few words to say about Sweeney, which he calls "the most important movie of 2007."
"You know that a movie wows an audience when nobody stirs during the closing credits. That's what happened at the end of Sweeney Todd tonight at the first critics' screening in Manhattan." So reports Tom O'Neil in his LATimes.com blog, Gold Derby. While he's not yet able to give a full review of the movie this far in advance of its December 21 release, he does have a few words to say about Sweeney, which he calls "the most important movie of 2007."
O'Neil, admittedly "biased as a diehard fan of the Broadway show," proclaims the film "the best I've seen all year." And according to his own unscientific poll of those in the audience at last night's screening, it seems there was unanimous agreement about the "brilliant" performance by Johnny Depp.
While there was much talk about whether Oscar voters will be able to bring themselves to vote for a film that doesn't shy from the bloodier aspects of the story, that hardly detracts from the power of the film for O'Neil: "In fact, it makes viewers feel so deeply in profound emotional and psychological ways, that it will haunt you, on many levels, long afterward. Director Tim Burton has created a masterpiece for the ages."
In the end, he's still hopeful that Oscar voters will reward Burton for what he has created, that "he so artfully adapts a revered classic." And besides, it's impossible to deny that "Johnny Depp is so damn cool."
For O'Neil's complete report from last night's screening, visit goldderby.latimes.com.
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Roger Friedman at FoxNews.com was also at the event and weighs in with his own kudos for the film and thoughts on its prospects for Oscar gold:
Depp gives such a complete and textured performance as the demon barber Sweeney Todd—in which he sings, as well—that it would be hard for the Academy to deny him again ... Tim Burton will be hard to ignore as well. He’s done the impossible and brought a masterpiece of a musical to film intact and almost to perfection.
Like Tom O'Neil, Friedman is a great fan of the Stephen Sondheim original and is happy to extend that to the on-screen adaptation—"I loved Burton’s film version."—and it's stars, saying that the director "cast everyone perfectly ... [T]hey are each superb."
While the final Oscar decisions are still a long way off, "it’s safe to say that Burton, Depp, Bonham Carter, Baron Cohen, et al. have done a remarkable job bringing Sondheim’s greatest show to the screen."
