Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Dark Shadows Review

                                                 
        
            I’m not going to bother to ask how this movie managed to get made because that’s really not a mystery.  Since Alice in Wonderland was so successful a couple of years ago, studios were more than willing to fund one of Tim Burton’s pet projects, especially with Johnny Depp on board as usual.  I’m not going to blame the studio for agreeing to make Dark Shadows because I know it probably seemed like a solid investment at the time.  I also won’t get angry at them for giving Burton a $150 million production budget because as usual he uses the money to make some stunning visuals and beautiful albeit gothic scenery.  As much as I usually enjoy his movies, the blame for this picture will probably go to the director himself and frankly, the blame is well deserved.                                       

            As many of you know, Dark Shadows is based on the 60s supernatural soap opera of the same name.  The show aired for about five years before being cancelled but has since gained a massive cult following.  The fans have been so dedicated over the years that both NBC and The WB made attempts to revive the show though ultimately both productions proved to be unsuccessful.  But enough of the history lesson what about the movie itself? 

            The movie begins with the son of a fishing magnate named Barnabas Collins (Depp) ending his brief relationship with a servant named Angelique (Eva Green) by saying he doesn’t love her.  Angelique turns out to be a very powerful, psychotic witch and unsurprisingly doesn’t take his rejection very well.  She takes her revenge on him by killing his parents, hypnotizing his girlfriend into jumping off a cliff, turning him into a vampire, having him buried alive in a coffin, and cursing his descendants to a lifetime of misery for good measure.  Seems like a bit of an overreaction but hey, what do I know?

            About 200 years later, Barnabas is finally released from his tomb and finds himself awakened in the 70s.  From here we are introduced to his descendants Elizabeth Collins Stoddard (Michelle Pfeiffer), her daughter Carolyn (Chloe Moretz), her brother Roger, and Roger’s son David.  Also living in the Collins estate are the family’s caretaker Willie, David’s live-in psychiatrist Dr. Hoffman and David’s recently hired governess Victoria. 

When Barnabas returns home he not only sees the run-down state of his family’s once proud mansion but also informed that the prominence of the family’s name has waned considerably as well.  Upon discovering this, he vows to restore the tattered reputation of the Collins name and break the so-called curse set upon his family by the still alive-and-kicking Angelique.  Naturally, shenanigans ensue, but mostly in the form of lame fish out of water jokes.  I’m not even joking; the entire first ninety minutes consists of Barnabas being puzzled by the strange customs and behaviors of the 70s.  This is mildly amusing for about the first twenty minutes but after that it becomes really grating to sit through.

            Most of these characters have so little consequence to the plot, I’m only able to tell you their names because I looked it up on Wikipedia.  If half of the cast had been taken out of this movie entirely, I doubt the story (what little there is) would’ve been changed at all.  Barnabas constantly talks about the family being in ruins largely because of Angelique’s curse but after watching this family I don’t really buy it.  The entire family just sits around and does nothing while bemoaning their so-called bad fortune of not having to work and living in the biggest mansion in town.  Their collective sense of entitlement and sloth-like behavior seems to have rubbed off on their hired help as well.  Their governess just seems to walk around the mansion with seemingly no memory of why she was hired in the first place.  Never once does the caretaker seem to so much as dust anything.  The little boy’s psychiatrist was apparently hired to treat him for a month and has instead lived in their house presumably rent-free for over three years with little sign that she’s even bothering to treat him at this point.  These people aren’t cursed, they’re just lazy. 

            If anything good has come from this, it’s that Depp has finally decided to take a break from Tim Burton movies for a little while by attaching himself to projects ranging from a Thin Man remake to a biopic about Dr. Seuss.  Otherwise the film as a whole was a complete grind to sit through.  So far, this is without a doubt the worst movie I’ve seen all year.  Mr. Burton I’m not angry, I’m just disappointed.  Actually scratch that I’m pretty angry too.

Grade: D-      

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