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I’ve seen a lot of reviews and forum posts stating that Tim Burton was the obvious choice to direct the film adaptation of Stephen Sondheim’s darkly comic Sweeney Todd, but to me the choice seemed somewhat risky. Burton’s rarely shown a light touch in his films, and the one successful instance where he did (Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure) hardly required the sort of balancing act between exaggerated comedy and poignant tragedy that Sondheim’s material requires. But then again, something of that balance is apparent in Edward Scissorhands… which also starred Johnny Depp and involved sharp implements, though not quite in the same manner. Nor did the former film require Depp to sing, though any concerns about his ability in this area were allayed by the soundtrack album. (For fans of the Broadway productions keeping score at home: no, he doesn’t have the range or theatricality of George Hearn, but he’s got a fierce, driven approach to the role that more than compensates, and he’s also well aware of the sly humor that’s as important to Todd’s character as his brooding, obsessive qualities.)

But any fears that Burton’s grimmer inclinations might be a problem are put to rest within the opening minutes of this brilliant adaptation. His visual imagination proves well-suited to bringing the story’s bleak, hardscrabble portrait of the London streets to life, but it also encompasses plenty of queasily humorous moments and stays true to its source material even as it makes a number of musical cuts to fit the tale into a two-hour running time. This is Burton’s best film since Ed Wood, and possibly his best ever; and it’s also the finest screen version of a Broadway musical since Chicago. I’d go so far as to say it’s one of the best films I’ve seen all year.

Sweeney Todd’s story is, at heart, a revenge tragedy: Todd, formerly known as Benjamin Barker, has returned to London after being set up by the vile Judge Turpin (Alan Rickman) and transported to Australia. Turpin wanted Barker’s beautiful young wife, and she ultimately poisoned herself after he and his equally despicable henchman Beadle Bamford (played by Timothy Spall as an obsequious, toad-like sack of fat) raped her. The judge then took Barker’s daughter Johanna (Jayne Wisener) as his ward. Todd learns all this when he returns to the site of his old barber shop and speaks with Mrs. Lovett (Helena Bonham Carter, sporting the most terrifying hair in movie history), proprietor of the worst meat pie establishment in London. Todd sets up business in his old room above the restaurant, plotting his vengeance on Turpin; but in the meantime, a run-in with a quack purveyor of hair restoratives called Pirelli (Sacha Baron Cohen-- describing his Pirelli as an Italian Borat wouldn’t be far off the mark) leads to an idea for a new secret ingredient to spice up Mrs. Lovett’s pies.

Depp does a magnificent job as Todd, conveying both the grim intensity and the sly humor of his personality; it’s not easy to get an audience to feel sympathy for a serial killer whose brutality escalates from a justifiable desire for revenge to outright nihilism, but Depp pulls it off. As Mrs. Lovett, Helena Bonham Carter has possibly an even greater challenge, as any interpretation of the character risks unfavorable comparisons with Angela Lansbury’s stage performance; but she makes such comparisons irrelevant by taking an entirely different approach, emphasizing the sorrowful, tragic elements of Mrs. Lovett and bringing the pathos of her unrealizable dreams of domestic tranquility with Todd to the fore (the “By The Sea” number, with its brightly colored dream of just such a future, reminded me of Edward Scissorhands but also made me realize how much better a film Sweeney Todd is, as this sequence has an emotional resonance far deeper than the earlier film’s blithely ironic depiction of suburban alienation). Rickman is his usual droll, deadpan self, and this approach is entirely suited to Turpin: an outwardly respectable man who views his perversions almost as a sort of perk of his position, and so treats the sentencing of innocents to death and his warped plan of marrying Johanna as casual, unimportant matters. He doesn’t have the strongest singing voice in the world, but his delivery works in the context of his performance.

While a number of songs are missing from the original score, and some of the ones retained have been edited (“A Little Priest” is about half the length of the Hearn/Lansbury version), the presentation of the music is magnificent. Sondheim insisted that Burton cast actors who could sing their own parts, and while this means not all of the cast is as technically accomplished as their Broadway counterparts, it also makes for a completeness to their performances that serves the story well. Burton stages each number in a sensible way, not trying too desperately to “open up” the play (after all, most of it revolves around Todd’s barber shop and Mrs. Lovett’s establishment) but also using panoramic shots and dramatic angles when they’re appropriate. And yes, the film is very violent, mostly in the second half; but the violence is exaggerated, not viscerally unpleasant the way the violence in Burton’s failed comedy Mars Attacks was, and it would be damn hard to tell this story without showing at least a few throats being slit.

Fans of Sondheim and Burton alike will love Sweeney Todd, and if you’re not already familiar with either this is a great place to start. This film is a genuine masterpiece, and I can’t recommend it highly enough.

Rating- 10/10