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Dark Shadows

Dark Shadows

While some of his fans debate and lament over the fact that Johnny Depp (undoubtedly one of the most talented and versatile actors of this or any generation) has yet to win an Oscar for any of his various roles, a closer look might indicate that Depp having not been honored (yet) might be due a little bit too much on his tendency to bury himself all too frequently in heavily made up “freakish” roles so to speak.  After the brilliance of his playing Hunter S. Thompson in Fear And Loathing and his nomination for the insanely charismatic pirate Jack Sparrow, Depp proceeded down a long rabbit hole of eccentrically stylized performances with such characters like Willy Wonka, Sweeney Todd (which resulted in another nomination), The Mad Hatter and even Tonto from The Lone Ranger, all of which were fun to watch (as well as being renderings of characters who were already made famous in earlier incarnations) but which also were possibly roles that were lacking the proper seriousness in order for him to be respected more as a straight up dramatic actor (although the nominations for Sparrow and Todd may have encouraged him to push even further in that direction).  In 2012, Depp would team again with his most notorious partner in crime in director Tim Burton to take on another strange, eccentric character in another known franchise, this being the old 1960s daytime soap opera that was (and still is) a revelation in its genre by mixing the melodramatic soap opera elements with a severe gothic / horror vibe, featuring vampires, witches, werewolves, ghosts and pretty much anything else that the show’s writers and creators could think up.  Depp was naturally cast as the show’s most popular creation in vampire Barnabas Collins who was originally played by Jonathan Frid (who cameoed here as a guest at a party shortly before dying in real life).  Spending most of his screentime in heavy vampire makeup along with the legendary hanging bangs hairstyle that was popularized by Frid, Depp along with Burton whip through the character’s backstory in the first five minutes of the film as Barnabas finds himself imprisoned in a chained up casket and forcefully buried for 200 years before reemerging in 1972 (a year after the original show went off the air) and experiencing some severe culture shock about the era he now finds himself in before returning to his family’s ancestral home and finding it nearly in disarray.  He wastes little time hypnotizing the family servant (Jackie Earl Haley, a runty little guy who found stardom late in life but has made the most of it by looking and acting different in nearly every major role he has ever had) into doing his bidding before meeting up with the current matriarch of the family (Michelle Pfeiffer) and confidentially telling her everything about the shocking truth of who he really is, promising never to harm any members of his own family in exchange for being accepted into the household and helping to rebuild the family business which is in the shipping and fishing industries.  The funny thing is that Pfeiffer (still looking great at her age), after making this agreement with Depp’s Barnabas early on, virtually becomes a background player for the rest of the movie with very, very little to do.  The rest of the dysfunctional Collins clan includes Pfeiffer’s daughter (Chloe Grace Moretz, still climbing that ladder to all time A list stardom with her amazing charisma) who is a rebellious teen with all of the usual trimmings, Pfeiffer’s brother (Jonny Lee Miller), who seems to have the personality of a block of wood, his son (Gulliver McGrath) who claims to still be having conversations with his dead mother, the son’s newly arrived Governess (Bella Heathcote) who is the spitting image of Barnabas’ long lost love from 200 years ago, and the son’s live in therapist (Helena Bonham Carter) who is more or less just a bitter old drunk herself.  There is also the elderly maid (Ray Shirley) who totters around cleaning things but doesn’t even get in one word of dialogue the whole movie.  The reason for so many of the family’s woes comes in the form of Angie (Eva Green) who opened up her own shipping business in the same small town and has obviously used her beauty and charisma to woo the town into supporting her endeavors moreso than The Collins Family.  But wait: Angie is also Angelique, the exact same witch who 200 years ago had a torrid love affair with Barnabas only to be rejected, leading her to put the curse on him that turned him into a vampire (yes, Barnabas was never bitten or turned by another) before having him buried alive.  Apparently, her witchcraft powers are so acute that she has remained young and beautiful all this time (and possesses the fighting powers of a superhero) so when she learns that Barnabas is above ground and back among the living, the battle of wits and hatred is revived anew.  Now while one can clearly see the melodramatic (soap opera) elements at play here, it should be remembered that the original show (and the revival from the 90s that featured Ben Cross as Barnabas) would always at least try to play things very straight, an effort that didn’t always work out due to bad writing and poor (very poor) low budget production values that often made it an object of ridicule with only Frid and the rest of the ensemble cast redeeming it by staying strictly in the moment and keeping it serious.  Burton on the other hand, has chosen to make this film almost nothing short of a comedic romp, cashing in on the absurdity of the old show along with the usual tropes of both vampire movies and “fish out of water” comedies (obviously Barnabas with his formal, old country way of speaking sticks out like a sore thumb) to almost be a spoof of its source material instead, giving us scenes such as the vampire hanging out in a friendly way with a bunch of pot smoking hippies before apologizing because he has to kill all of them now (he must still drink blood to survive).  The comedic elements get so overwhelming at times that it’s easy to forget that at one time Frid had also played Barnabas in not one but two theatrical feature films that not only were deadly serious in their own right, but (unlike the show) had real budgets along with an abundance of blood, violence, gore, and sexual content that would have been impossible to have on network TV and thus earning their hard R ratings (one film was even said to be a direct remake of Bram Stoker’s Dracula novel with Barnabas filling in for the lead role instead) whereas this film’s much watered down PG-13 rating and obvious desire to be goofy and hip rather than scary make it a stark contrast to what had come before.  Taken solely on those terms alone, the film hits its high water mark with the appearance of Alice Cooper performing a concert during a party at the estate with his immortal classic Ballad Of Dwight Fry being brilliantly used to underscore some key character development that is laid out during that time.  But alas, once Alice departs the film it never manages to hit that kind of peak ever again, just sort of bumbling along to its conclusion, a superfight of sorts between Eva Green’s witch character (whose strength, fighting skills and ability to absorb punishment would make Wonder Woman wince) and the entire Collins family, with the last minute twist of one family member actually being a full fledged werewolf coming completely out of nowhere and not working at all in any way whatsoever.  It seems that Burton has dismissed the serious melodramatics of the original series (and the fact that it was played so damn straight alongside the supernatural elements which was probably the reason for the show’s popularity) as being factors that are better off being mocked in an adaptation during this day and age, ridiculous relics of a bygone era that can only work now as a goofball comedy, but then again this is a guy who has done Beetlejuice, Willy Wonka and many other films that could have been far edgier than they turned out to be but all of which still proudly carry the PG-13 tag on them.  As for Depp, he doesn’t disappoint when it comes to turning in another zany, oddball performance, certainly proving that he can act and also carry an amazing presence with him, but hopefully when the time comes for a performer with his undisputed talent to go out and do something that The Academy Awards voters (not the sharpest bunch when it comes to taste) won’t label as just being another freakshow performance, he might finally get that respect and validation which he deserves…

7/10

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