Sweeney Todd (Tim Burton, 2007)

[Magic Hate Ball]

Saw this a couple nights ago. Good, but too flat. Needed to be either more subtle or far more over-the-top. I get that they were doing the whole "they're singing in their heads" thing, but without the chorus of God That's Good or the rhyming jokes break in Try The Priest, it just falls flat. It felt like they were just playing out what they've already done before, which is too bad because Sweeney is a whiz-bang show (the original run had a loud whistle hanging in the audience that went off whenever he slit someone's throat), and it needed to be a whiz-bang movie. But it wasn't, and that's too bad. I did like the ending, and that they showed the end of Mrs Lovett, but it was too little too late.

On the subject of Sondheim, I love the soundtrack for A Little Night Music, the waltz being one of my favorite time signatures. I enjoyed the first half of Sunday In The Park but, even though I got choked up at the end, still found the second half to be flat.

I have nothing to say on gay artists or whatever, besides the little anecdote about half of Palahniuk's devoted fanbase turning rabidly against him when he came out of the closet.

[Dylan]

The budget for Sweeney Todd was reportedly $200 million (not including the press) and it made an estimated $9,350,000 this weekend.

$200 Mil? According to Newsday, $50 million was the budget before P&A. I'd be surprised if this movie cost more than "Bruce Allmighty". (I haven't seen the film, but can't think of where $200 mil would go...) I could be wrong, it just seems like that figure is awfully high.

I now think I was mis-informed, but I've heard 200 in quite a few places. After seeing the film, however, I was having trouble dividing the sum as it certainly didn't seem like a production that treaded in the hundred-millions, so 50 seems far more correct.

Although I quite liked Sweeney Todd, I actually like it more the more I think about it, especially since I now have the soundtrack.

[malcolm1980]

Sweeney Todd's budget is $65 million including P&A, I believe. It should at least make back it's money if we include overseas.

[Zumpano]

On my into seeing "Charlie Wilson's War", I passed a couple (male & female) standing outside the "Sweeney Todd" theater. The male was obviously pissed and I overheard: "I didn't know it was going to be like that! They didn't show them singing in the commercial!"

It blows my mind that a person who had decided to pay money and go see the movie would:

A) Not know it's a musical. ( Regardless of the commercials)

and/or

B) Be completely turned off by the fact people sing that they would want to leave the theater, angrily, and choose a different film.

Granted, I am visiting my family in Oklahoma. But still...

[David Ehrenstein]

The musical is a radical art form deeply offensive to heterosexual male privilege.

[justeleblanc]

The musical is a radical art form deeply offensive to heterosexual male privilege.

I assume that's a joke.

[MichaelB]

It blows my mind that a person who had decided to pay money and go see the movie would:

A) Not know it's a musical. ( Regardless of the commercials)

My brother watched Demy's Les Parapluies de Cherbourg, on my recommendation, without knowing in advance that it was sung throughout - but he absolutely loved it.

[domino harvey]

It blows my mind that a person who had decided to pay money and go see the movie would:

A) Not know it's a musical. ( Regardless of the commercials)

My brother watched Demy's Les Parapluies de Cherbourg, on my recommendation, without knowing in advance that it was sung throughout - but he absolutely loved it.

Trust me, in Oklahoma, it being sung would take a backseat to it being in French.

[kaujot]

As much as it pains me to see all the Oklahoma bashing, it's all quite true.

[MichaelB]

They're not very keen on films in German, either...

[domino harvey]

Kelly Ogle needs to weigh in on the matter

[David Ehrenstein]

"I assume that's a joke."

You wish!

[David Ehrenstein]

"Have we not come far enough to realize that the musical is hardly a radical art form deeply offensive to male privilege, but, rather an alternative view of contemporary themes and issues?"

No. Singing is a sign of weakness in men as far as this culture is concerned. And any sign of weaknesss means you might as well just lay back and throw your legs up over your head.

[justeleblanc]

The musical is a radical art form deeply offensive to heterosexual male privilege.

A strange interpretation from David, and like many non-sequitor interpretations, it seems to reveal more about the interpretor than the interpreted.

David, you are seeing what you want to see in the musical, and you are misreading it. You may have a problem with heterosexual male privilege, but that doesn't mean the art forms you like also share in this bitterness. Frankly, I was embarrassed that you would reveal that about yourself on this forum.

[jorencain]

....but Liking Musicals = You're A Fag is a bit extreme.

I don't know about that. You live in NY, right? That's not quite representative of the rest of the country, of course (and unfortunately). I lived in TX for 4 years, and I'm now in GA; there is definitely a conservative homophobic vibe still alive and well. I taught saxophone lessons at a school in Texas where, I was told by a teacher, if a guy didn't TRY OUT for the football team, it was assumed by his classmates that he was gay. I was working in a job with grown men (and this was in the DC area) who felt they had to make (many) jokes about other guys going to see "Brokeback Mountain". And I'm now teaching at a school where I'm fairly certain "liking musicals=gay" to a lot of people. I'm not saying that kids are getting beat up here or anything like that, but there's still a stigma attached to liking musicals. I don't know of many students at my school who are hanging out and talking about "Dreamgirls" or "Hairpsray".

It blows my mind that a person who had decided to pay money and go see the movie would:

A) Not know it's a musical. ( Regardless of the commercials)

and/or

B) Be completely turned off by the fact people sing that they would want to leave the theater, angrily, and choose a different film.

I'm not at all surprised that it was marketed without singing in many of the trailers. Of course they would rather "trick" people into going to something that they wouldn't go see otherwise. Whether it's a questions of sexuality or homphobia, I don't know, but "Johnny Depp slasher movie" is going to bring in more people than "Sondheim musical".

[HerrSchreck]

I too disagree with David. The musical, the "song and dance number" combining elements of "the play" with "singing & dancing" goes way way back prior to both cinema itself and the perception (I use this word strenuously) of it's co-option, in the eyes of certain middle-american sexually terrified males, by the gay community. I think DE (CORRECTED) is choosing to put the eyes of the most sexually retarded and unsophisticated male hetero men in the eyes of every male hetero man regardless of their level of cultural sophistication.

The musical, and the musical comedy, were as red-blooded hetero as possible. Gin-stinking, chick-chasing, vaudevillian, later jazzified, suave & sophisticated, low and cruddy in English and Lower East Side dance-hall days, it was the night out. The floor show as the nightclub scene picked up in the jazz age and the decades following was the height of sophistication, or comedy, or peekaboo leg & tit peering for drunk and red-blooded men in all manner of joint from low dive to high-end Copacabana-type deal. And all this was epitomized in the birth and mid-life of the musical, from Busby B, from the Z Follies, the great stuff from Astaire Rogers, the French Stage of Josephine Baker, etc. From Disney's epic cartoon musicals (masterpieces, many of them to be sure), to the Sound of Music, to West Side, to Singin In The Rain, Guys & Dolls, the golden age of Mgm, Oz, etc, American Middle Class loved the musical as much as anything else.

In terms of the American cinema, the musical is dead. There are no musicals being made by monstrously talented weavers of dream and surface. However and within Whomever middle-American Knuckleheads perceive the nostalgia for the golden age of the musical as residing within, means nothing about the reality of the golden age of the musical. They were the bread and butter for a night out for all class of red blooded man and women. Seeking an opinion on the state their present cultural status in the minds of brainless FreedomFry-munching culturephobes is like seeking a summary of the present cultural status of the silent film (or anything, for that matter) at a WWF Smackdown.

Except for the WWF Smackdown itself of course.

EDIT: to joren... idiocy will never go away. Texas (60% of all executions this year in Texas, bucking the national trend) & Georgia are the deep south and I'm not going to get sucked into this kind of a painful discussion. I'm simply warning of the dangers of puttting the most idiotic opinions into the mouths of "the average hetero man". Sure the stereotype exists. One can also say that "a hell of a lot of gays love musicals".. I have no statistics at hand. But what's the difference. Artists in general, anything having to do with any kind of sensitivity and introspection, will see you getting pegged by picket fence macho-men. It's everywhere and part of life for the aesthete... even in the Bronx where I grew up and still live with wannabe wiseguy hardass guidos. Big shit.

[David Ehrenstein]

"The musical, and the musical comedy, were as red-blooded hetero as possible. Gin-stinking, chick-chasing, vaudevillian, later jazzified, suave & sophisticated, low and cruddy in English and Lower East Side dance-hall days, it was the night out. "

which of course explains its attraction to the likes of Lorenz Hart, Cole porter, John Latouche, Kander & Ebb, and Stephen Sondheim (among others.)

[Belmondo]

"The musical, and the musical comedy, were as red-blooded hetero as possible. Gin-stinking, chick-chasing, vaudevillian, later jazzified, suave & sophisticated, low and cruddy in English and Lower East Side dance-hall days, it was the night out. "

which of course explains its attraction to the likes of Lorenz Hart, Cole porter, John Latouche, Kander & Ebb, and Stephen Sondheim (among others.)

Nah, it was merely a better outlet for their point of view as expressed in their sophisticated lyrics - Tin Pan Alley didn't get it at the time and pop music didn't get it later. Sondheim still laughs at the fact that his only hit song is "Send in the Clowns" which he wrote for a character with a limited vocal range.

Anyway, in my earlier post, I tried and apparently completely failed, to suggest that we are moving away nicely from these preoccupations with sexual orientation which should, and in most cases do, no longer matter unless that is the subject matter of the show in question. Yeah, I know it means that we have to keep arguing about Bobby in "Company", but still ...

[David Ehrenstein]

"I tried and apparently completely failed, to suggest that we are moving away nicely from these preoccupations with sexual orientation which should, and in most cases do, no longer matter unless that is the subject matter of the show in question."

Tell it to the RNC!

[HerrSchreck]

"The musical, and the musical comedy, were as red-blooded hetero as possible. Gin-stinking, chick-chasing, vaudevillian, later jazzified, suave & sophisticated, low and cruddy in English and Lower East Side dance-hall days, it was the night out. "

which of course explains its attraction to the likes of Lorenz Hart, Cole porter, John Latouche, Kander & Ebb, and Stephen Sondheim (among others.)

Dave there are plenty of gay men and women around the arts in general going back to the Greek proscenium, making this "musical" Specialization an uneccessary historical customization.

It sounds suspiciously like you want the musical to be stuffed (with secret pride) in the Gay Box... which is absurd. It belonged to nobody and everybody in the times of it's vibrancy. All this "gayifying" of the musical en toto is an ex-post facto assignation because the musical is dead... and so, like any defunct art form, is misunderstood by historical ignoramuses (the Texas duncesters & suburban he-man deerstalking hunters et al), who are oblivious to a thousand other historical facts and types, of course.

If many gay men love musicals nowadays, it still means nothing. Fans of a vintage form now defunct say nothing about the life of it when living. Were silent films practiced by history professors and antisocial wackjobs like me, simply because we're fans?

That's hillbilly logic. Steer clear at all costs.

[justeleblanc]

"Have we not come far enough to realize that the musical is hardly a radical art form deeply offensive to male privilege, but, rather an alternative view of contemporary themes and issues?"

No.

Singing is a sign of weakness in men as far as this culture is concerned. And any sign of weaknesss means you might as well just lay back and throw your legs up over your head.

Seriously, does anyone else actually buy this argument about a straight man listening to another man sing? I'm under the impression that David's view of our culture is pretty simplified, naive, and provincial. But if this point of view helps him understand life and art, so be it.

[bunuelian]

I think DH is choosing to put the eyes of the most sexually retarded and unsophisticated male hetero men in the eyes of every male hetero man regardless of their level of cultural sophistication.

Well put, but that's his strategy, not his point.

I thought the Bresson discussion revealed clearly enough that DE plays the role of the "hetero-hating gay bigot" to smash perceptions and force his targets (the overwhelming majority with their none-too-suppressed homophobia) into visceral response - which here at least results in quality dialogue. He takes the extreme view because it's the only way to move the ignorant middle toward something resembling change. Hetero folks who find themselves pigeonholed into stereotypes can learn something from it, if they are willing to think about it. It's the successful approach of many radicals (feminists have done well with it).

Certainly it's not too far of a stretch to find a lot of gay culture in musicals, and to point to that as a reason for a lot of hetero men finding musicals discomforting. I've struggled for years to overcome the latent homophobia of my upbringing, and can see the seed of truth in what DE is saying. I just tend to ignore those aspects of his posts that arise from his position as self-appointed global arbiter of True Gayness and his necessarily incediary oversimplification of the heterosexual perspective.

[HerrSchreck]

I think DH is choosing to put the eyes of the most sexually retarded and unsophisticated male hetero men in the eyes of every male hetero man regardless of their level of cultural sophistication.

Well put, but that's his strategy, not his point.

I thought the Bresson discussion revealed clearly enough that DH plays the role of the "hetero-hating gay bigot" to smash perceptions and force his targets (the overwhelming majority with their none-too-suppressed homophobia) into visceral response - which here at least results in quality dialogue. He takes the extreme view because it's the only way to move the ignorant middle toward something resembling change. Hetero folks who find themselves pigeonholed into stereotypes can learn something from it, if they are willing to think about it. It's the successful approach of many radicals (feminists have done well with it).

Certainly it's not too far of a stretch to find a lot of gay culture in musicals, and to point to that as a reason for a lot of hetero men finding musicals discomforting. I've struggled for years to overcome the latent homophobia of my upbringing, and can see the seed of truth in what DH is saying. I just tend to ignore those aspects of his posts that arise from his position as self-appointed global arbiter of True Gayness and his necessarily incediary oversimplification of the heterosexual perspective.

I'm not so sure about this, and I'd let the man speak for himself anyhow. I think Dave is like any other intelligent film critic... he has his biases, predilictions, as well as his insights. It's what's on the tray when you read anyone with a strong personality. I talked about this awhile ago someplace here-- people who commit to their own convictions. I salute him for being himself, faults (many of which exist for the multiple potentials for bias in his Human Profile I'm sure he's suffered now as well as in a lot less friendly times) and brains included. I think he truly believed what he wrote when he wrote it, and probably still does, perhaps with some introspection due to the exchange here.

Saying straight men think gays like musicals isn't telling straight men anything. And it's not telling gay men anything productive either. He's just hammering home a stereotype at the expense of a thousand truths in a zillion minds... to undo the stereotype?

[justeleblanc]

to undo the stereotype?

Maybe, but -- in my opinion -- his understanding of straight men and their aesthetics is a flawed understanding. And he speaks with arrogant authority as if he is going to teach us all a lesson. Whether or not he has pent up bitterness toward heterosexuals shouldn't be an issue, but in this case of looking at musical theater, not just by the red necks in oklahoma who probably don't appreciate art, but by everyone who happens to not be gay, David E's bitterness is clouding reality.

[noelbotevera]

It's magnificent, a film about textures both emotional and visual. Gleaming cobblestones, cracked mirrors, flawed windowpanes, rough wood, rusted iron, frayed cloth, and above all and everyone the towering spires of London, done as a kind of watercolor Edwardian illustration (with plenty of grays and blacks)--one of the few cases where I thought digital effects more than justified their use. Johnny Depp doesn't so much belt the songs out in that tiresome Broadway manner as use them to worm his way into the character, his eyes tunneling not outwards at people but inwards, into his tortured soul, at his vision of what things should be.