Tim Burton and Johnny Depp team up for a seventh time for this film adaption of a 1970’s TV show that no one can remember. Probably just as well we can’t as we would all automatically be comparing the two.
In Dark Shadows, Depp plays Barnabas Collins, one of the founders of Collinswood who was turned into a vampire by Angelique Bouchard, a witch played by Eva Green. Baranabas is released from his buried coffin and finds himnself in Collinswood in 1972, where he meets his ancestors and hopes to return the family home to its former glory. He finds though, that he not the only strange one in the family.
Instead of playing this with a dark outlook, Burton decided to go full on comedy with his ‘Dark Shadows’ and there are parts of it that are extremely funny, with one liners to die for. Clever double entendres mean that Dark Shadows has a 12A rating instead of a PG.
The Collins Family and their surrounding motley crew are played by a fantastic cast, Michelle Pfeiffer plays Elizabeth Collins Stoddard while Mrs. Burton aka Helena Bonham Carter, is fantastic in the role of Dr. Julia Hoffman. As for Johnny Depp, he yet again excels in this role. The man can do no wrong.
The staging and set design for the film is spectacular and the grading and colours used beautifully mimic the early seventies.
Dark Shadows is a fun two hours that will leave you giggling. Any movie that has rock icon, Alice Cooper playing himself can’t be bad! Going on the ending, the door has been left open for a sequel.