Friday, November 1, 2013

Week 4

Dark Shadows

I remember seeing the trailer for this movie a year ago. A friend sent me a link on my facebook.

It was the latest Tim Burton movie! And, at first, I was kind of excited. The trailer made it look fun and comedic. My friend actually suggested that we should go see it when it comes out when it comes out. But a few minutes later, I remembered Tim Burton's last movie I watched...Alice In Wonderland. The less I say about that, the better. But, there was a bit of a hope spot. I loved Sweeney Todd...so, that's one Burton movie that was good in the 2000s....

I never got to see the movie with my friend when it came out...but she said the movie sucked....so naturally, I had to see it when it came out on DVD.

It blew. It was...bad.

Johnny Depp plays Barnabas Collins, a man who is in love with a woman but, after a jealous fit with someone who's in love with him, she casts a spell on her to kill herself by throwing herself off a cliff. Distraught, he does the same thing, only the jealous girl turns him into a vampire before he hits the ground.

So...what? She traps him to make him his lover? Nope. Get the townsfolk to turn against him and bury him for years and years, while chained up in a wooden box. I would ask why they don't just kill him...but then his spirit would be with his lover's...and the jealous girl doesn't want that.

So, cut the 70s and there's a family who I don't really care much about that has the same last name as he does. Barnabas escapes after construction workers let him lose and he kills them because he's thirsty. As much I think this guy wouldn't be a good guy in my books, he's better than the vampires in Twilight...yeah, because THAT isn't an old joke.

So, he goes to live with the family in the house and only the mother of the family knows that he's a vampire and wants to keep it a secret. I wouldn't mind so much but she says that this HAS to be a secret. Ummm, he said that he would not hurt the family because they are part of the family tree. It's going to be odd at first but...they'll get over it. After all, they live in a GOTHIC CASTLE! And there is a huge picture of Barnabas hung up in the house...and he looks like a vampire!

And then, the jealous girl who turned him into a vampire finds out that he escaped and goes to him...not to lock him back up but to ask him for his love...but he's in love with the governess of the house...and I knew exactly what was going to happen in the climax. If you either watch the beginning of this movie or have read the beginning of this, you'll know what's going to happen in the last few minutes.

The problem with this movie is the tone. It goes through it all. One minute, it's a gothic dramatic story, another minute it's a fish out of water (or fish from another time) story which is trying to be a comedy, then it goes back to horror. I haven't had so many mood whiplashes since the last time I watched a Firefly episode...and that did it right.

(rubs neck)

Bottom line, this movie does not do the original show justice. And I mean how the Miami Vice movie was made to piss on the original show. Thank God this movie bombed so there wouldn't have to be a sequel.

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