Sweeney Todd - The Demon Barber of Fleet Street Details

A very long two hours

Ok, I went in not thinking and hadn't twigged it was a musical, and I loathe musicals, so it was never going to be good for me. But even so, this seems a particularly bad example of the genre. Depp sings like a bad Bowie impersonator (think Phil Cornwell) and the songs are weak. When he and Rickman are singing about pretty women I couldn't restrain my laughter.

My general gripe with musicals is that the songs just get in the way - they don't move the narrative along, so you're just waiting for them to finish and get back to the real film. This is particularly true with this film. But it looks good, and when they're not arseing about with duff songs, it is engaging and enjoyable enough. It's just those songs....

[Highly rated reviewer]

Tim Burton's big mistake

I sat down anticipating to watch a great story retold through a brilliant cast topped off with plenty of gore and dark humour. In fairness there was gore, there was dark humour and a good cast however it was all ruined by the singing! What was Tim Burton thinking making Sweeny Todd the musical? Musicals are clearly not his strong point! It was painful! My advice to Mr. Burton is, leave the musicals to Andrew Lloyd-Webber!