[Sca-cooks] OT & OOP: Sweeney Todd movie

Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius adamantius1 at verizon.net
Fri Nov 30 08:36:21 PST 2007


On Nov 30, 2007, at 9:57 AM, Nick Sasso wrote:

> -----Original Message-----
> <snip>
> Apart from gratuitous Ben Affleck as Sweeney,
> it's actually an enormous amount of fun. George Carlin gets killed and
> everything!   > > > > > > >
>
>
> The PTA was mortified!!  the talent show for the elementary school  
> kids, and
> it was a hoot.

Yes, it's within the framework of the father having to make the choice  
to interview to get back his high-powered publicist job, or  
participate in his kid's elementary school talent show. Every other  
kid, of course, has his or her parents dressed up as one of Old  
Possum's Cats, all doing the same song from "Cats". Pfeh. The nun  
running the show introduces Gertie Trinke and her family performing "a  
song  that I can only assume is a hymn: "God, That's Good!", _not_  
from "Cats", but from the musical, "Sweeney Todd". It's the scene  
where a huge throng of hungry customers are enjoying the best dubious  
meat pies on Fleet Street on the lower level of the set, while  
Sweeney's Magical Mystery Mechanical Barber's Chair is delivered,  
installed, and tested up above...

The nun's reaction when she finally realizes what she's just allowed  
onto her stage is pretty priceless.

>  It is to date my only exposure to Sweeney the barber.  I
> thought from that movie scene that it was about the woman/girl  
> character . .

The Liv Tyler character? Yeah, well, it being Liv Tyler just-post-LOTR  
would have made that an easy mistake to make, but she's actually not  
one of the leads.   She does make a game attempt in playing Tobias in  
that scene, though. She sings about as well as Helena Bonham Carter ;-).

> . imagine my surprise.  I should have paid closer attention.  The  
> dad was
> the barber, if I recall, and his arrival at the school stage was in  
> itself a
> sort of redemption sort of thing.

Yes, redemption and the making of the right choice, culminating in a  
moment redolent of both Show Boat and 42nd Street. It's also glorious  
because Kevin Smith gets to express his true feelings about the  
musical "Cats" (which curiously mirror my own), and implicitly, his  
feelings about "Sweeney Todd" (which curiously mirror my own). We  
don't get to his true feelings about Peter Jackson's LOTR movies  
(which curiously mirror my own) until the seven or eight-minute  
incredibly obscene rant in "Clerks II".

>  Imagine that I am one of 17 people :o)

Hey, how can you not like a movie featuring the fictional death of  
Jennifer Lopez (not that this is a spoiler or anything; it's like  
saying the mother dies in The Sound of Music -- what a surprise),  
references to Taylor Spiced Pork Roll, _and_ Sweeney Todd?

Adamantius



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