Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
(Tim Burton, 2007)
IMDB

Based on the Broadway musical, this is Tim Burton's adaptation of the age old tale of Sweeney Todd. Immediately, the film is recognisably Burton, with the obvious casting of Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham-Carter.

The film starts off with mechanical, silhouetted imagery. Everything appears through a dark filter, as if to accentuate the dirt and darkness of life in Victorian London. Todd's (Depp) face appears ghostly light, grey amongst the blacks and blues of the mysterious, shadowy, gleaming wet cobbled streets of London. A single noir-esque light casts across the street.

The flashback scenes, in which times were evidently better, the imagery is visually much more crisp, brighter and full of colour, as if to be emitting a warm glow. The crisp, clean whites; so different to the, almost underworld, visual qualities of the rest of the film. Similarly in the flashback to Judge Turpin's party, a masked ball, the surroundings are visually luxurious, filled with reds and golds, feathers, velvet and candles. The imagery becomes visibly overpowering and increasingly decadent as the pace of the scene rapidly increases and acquires a sense of urgency. Characters, abundant with masks of mythical creatures, surround the frame, bringing about a rush of colour and emotion.

Back to the Victorian London of the primary narrative, the colours darken and dampen again. In Lovett's pie shop, complete with it's dusty net curtains that, appropriately (in a Tim Burton film!) appear like cobwebs, flour and dust appears to coat every surface, completely blanketing the dark wooden furniture, absolutely none of which shines. Each surface too, literally crawling with cockroaches.

A set I'm particularly fond of in this film is the actual barber's attic. It's dusty wooden floorboards, lit by a single hazy light from the roof window. Other parts of the single room are hidden by the shadows and the furniture is minimal. The dull, broken mirror provides only fragmented reflections, a true reflection of the characters' personalities.

As Lovett fantasizes of a life away from the city with Todd, her ideas are expressed with essentially warm colours. As she wishes for a life by the sea, the colours used are typically nautical, pale blues and whites, represented by worn beach huts and deckchairs. The fantasy scenes are visually inviting, you feel the warmth in Lovett's desire for family life, in her desire for colour, away from the darkness of London.