July in December

Away We Go
Starring John Krasinski, Maya Rudolph, Catherine O'Hara, Jeff Daniels, Allison Janney, Maggie Gyllenhaal, and Chris Messina

An odyssey of discovery for a grungy couple who discover they're going to have a baby. Excellent performances from the "monsters" on the road. Also, Dave Eggers and Vendela (actually married in real life) write an excellent, realistic screenplay allowing natural chemistry for Krasinski and Rudolph.

Grade: B+


Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Starring Daniel Radcliff, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson, Jim Broadbent, Michael Gambon, Helena Bohnam Carter, and Maggie Smith

One of the better "Harry Potter" films, but the writers or director or editors failed to include a pulsing battle at the climax of the plot. Beautifully shot, but hugely anticlimactic.

Grade: B-


Bruno
Starring Sacha Baron Cohen

Indecent, overtly raunchy, pointless, and unfunny. I loved "Borat", but "Bruno" was just horrible.

Grade: D-

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

Starring Johanny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Alan Rickman, Timothy Spall, Sacha Baron Cohen & Jamie Campbell Bower

The themes are revenge and love, the symbols are blood and barber knives, and the motif is a barber chair that sends murder victims down a hatch, crunching on the stones below, only to be used for meat pies sold to the general public. And are we hungry! Tim Burton's film adaptation of the ground-breaking musical that showcased Broadway's darkside, "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street," does just as Todd's mechanical chair. We are shot down a hole of music that knocks us senseless, characters so interwoven that we fall for the spell of the unpredictable, and whole lot of blood. With original music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, a most intricate composer, and the horrific unusualness of Burton, Sweeney's story unfolds beautifully.

The beauty of blood is shown in the very first scene. As we listen to the introductory music, we watch blood drip and flow through London's underground. London is dark. London is dangerous. With a sailor boy named Anthony (Jamie Campbell Bower), Sweeney (Johnny Depp) arrives after years of imprisonment and is out to kill the man who wrongly accused him, putting him away: Judge Turpin (Alan Rickman). However, before he tries to hack the judge, he meets Mrs. Lovett (Helena Bonham Carter), who owns a shop, selling "the worst pies in London," according to the song. Anthony falls in love with a young girl tucked away in a house. She is Johanna (Jayne Wisener), Todd's daughter and now captive of Turpin. We learn that Turpin wishes to marry the young Johanna, which of course puts pressure on Anthony to rescue her. We are also given other characters who play great roles in the rising of the plot: Toby (Ed Sanders), the boy who begins to work for Mrs. Lovett; Beadle (Timothy Spall), who weasels his way in and out of the streets, working for Turpin; Signor Pirelli (Sacha Baron Cohen), who loses a barber contest to Todd (and later loses a bit more); and the beggar woman (Laura Michelle Kelly), the only character to sense the evil going on in Todd's barber shop.

Every actor and actress sings and performs incredibly well, bringing the musical's usual thrusting melody to a cold whisper. Depp is creepy as he was in many-a-film, and Rickman, Cohen, and the other cast members were are great, however, the real triumph was Helena Bonham Carter's Mrs. Lovett. Her voice is soothing and crisp, while her portrayal was desperately great. The newcomers caught on to Burton's oddities, particularly Jamie Campbell Bower. The usually dull innocence of Anthony was annoying in the stage production (I Netflixed it), but Bower - and I'm sure with the help of Burton - gave the role a wolfish sense, something wild and hungry, yet his voice was high and chilling.

And on top of all this, there was blood. Burton reached back to classic horror films and brought the red stuff streaming out. With every slash of the barber knife, it poured, sprayed, splattered. It looked great, and with significant killings, Burton changed the ways of his blood dripping mechanics. Bloody perfection.

It looked great, sounded great, and felt great. "Sweeney Todd" is at the top this year for it's ability to bring the stage to life on screen.

Grade: A+