L U N A T A L K with Eva Moon

Enchanted Sweeney

December 29, 2007 on 12:20 pm | In General Musing, Movies |

Here’s a double bill for a holiday weekend: Tim Burton’s Sweeney Todd followed by Disney’s Enchanted.

The two movies have a couple of things in common: Character actor Timothy Spall appears in both movies, in a similar role, oddly enough. In Sweeney Todd, he plays evil judge Turpin’s sidekick, the beadle and in Enchanted he’s evil queen Narissa’s sidekick, Nathaniel. Both are musicals. And both are worth seeing.

There, the similarities are lopped off with a decisive sweep of the razor.

Sweeney Todd is a grisly, gornographic helping of hemoglobin, but it’s so stylishly lush I’ll forgive the bloody excess. Johnny Depp’s theatrically raised arm gave me enough warning to know when to cover my eyes. (I admit it: I’m a wimp.) The man can put over a song too. Who knew? Helena Bonham Carter doesn’t really have the pipes to give Mrs. Lovett her due, but she’s so pitch perfect in the role, you’ll eat up whatever she serves. Her rendition of The Worst Pies in London is, um… unforgettable. Alan Rickman, true to form, steals every scene with his flawless timing and who could imagine a more perfect Signor Pirelli than the lanky and outrageous Sascha Baron Cohen?

After filling up on bloody soup, we felt in need of dessert. Enchanted proved to be just the thing - a frothy little confection, lightly dusted with enough wry humor to settle the meat pies. The opening scene is a perfect send up of every Disney princess movie cliche and what followed was either enchanting or we were so grateful for a cheerful, sunny NYC after Burton’s dark, perennially twilit London, that we mistook relief for art. Whatever the cause, we laughed out loud and left the theater convinced it was the next Princess Bride.

In retrospect, I have to think some of our appreciation of Enchanted was due to its contrast to Sweeney Todd. The next Princess Bride? What was I thinking? Have fun storming the castle…

See more like that one:

• Oscar Night: There Will Be Food
• Anything Else But This
• Guilty Pleasures, A to Z
• Ca$h Inside