If Broadway musicals where women Sweeney Todd would then have been my wife of 30 years. I first fell in love with her the moment I saw the play in NYC with Angela Lansbury in command.

Her character, Mrs. Lovett, is the center of the play, not Todd.

Her performance glued and carried the play with such madness, such humanity, such comedy.

All of it missing from Tim Burton's version.

Frankly speaking, ever since I saw Beetlejuice I've always been convinced Mr. Burton is not a storyteller but a cinematographer.

It's a shame to see his Sweeny Todd version wasted on such poor acting and directing.

I suppose that with the proper director the actors would have done much better.

But Johnny Depp as Todd? I never liked the idea and it wasn't nice to see my fears come true. He doesn't have the voice and the presence the character requires.

And he's way too young for it, too.

Helena Bohnam Carter and Alan Rickman are also wrong for the roles. With Ms. Carter one could argue there's hope if someone were to get on her case and get the best out of her.

The problem with Rickman as the judge is his athletic figure and size which makes it very difficult to see the character beneath it.

The physical and mental isolation of Mr. Todd and Mrs. Lovett is also missing from the film. These folks have been deranged by the hardships and injustices of life and that doesn't come through in the film.

Johnny Depp's Todd also lacks in madness, humanity and comedy. Rather, the entire movie is spent with him just being pissed. That's the only note he was willing to play at times pathetically so.

It was impossible for me to feel for the guy at the end of the movie.

It's truly unfortunate to see the main actors and the director in this movie take themselves so seriously. The worst example being Sacha Baron Cohen as Mr. Pirelli.

You have got to be kidding me. What is Mr. Cohen trying to prove here? That he's also good at drama? Wrong play, Mr. Cohen, you got the wrong play.

I'm glad the music and some of the singing came through well, although I dearly missed the hideous factory whistle that punctuated the play and set its tone.

Overall I'm not happy with Mr. Burton's Todd and nor shall I see it again. I'll save my ears and my sight for the Broadway version so Ms. Lansbury can fill them with the delirious world she created in it.

I haven't seen the film yet, and will reserve judgment on all other aspects (though I'll say I'm glad to hear that the musical--one of my favorites, but then, I hate most musicals [that might be more harshly stated than I really feel, but the form is waaaaaay overdue for some sort of kick in arse]--has been trimmed a bit; too bad they didn't eliminate Anthony in his entirety, because I've never understood the dramatic purpose of his role; I require no "foil" for misanthropy), but someone should point out that Johnny Depp is in his 40s. At the time in which the piece takes place, relatively few people ever saw 50.

That he's too youthful looking may indeed be true. My ideal cast, in my mind (other than myself as Todd and my lovely wife as Lovett, a dream that could yet be realized on stage)
would have been Ian McShane (of Deadwood, among other things) and Brenda Blethyn.

And while I can't disagree that Burton is more a cinematographer than a storyteller, the fact is that film may not, in its ideal condition, really be a narrative art form; the neo-realists, French New Wave directors, and other sundry "pure cinema" advocates would certainly suggest as much. And I'd rather sit through even the most banal of his strictly visual exercises than through the best of Ron Howard's framed-for-TV character studies, not because the latter is without talent, but because he's inherently acinematic and conceptually . . . I was going to say "anemic," then "middlebrow," but I think what I mean is "conservative."

Well, the funny thing here is that as soon as Tim Burton agreed to make the film of "Sweeney Todd," it was practically preordained that Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham-Carter would get the leads. I doubt that Burton considered any other actor for either role from the second he signed his contract.

Burton and Johnny Depp are a deeply bonded pair. Burton first used the talented Depp in "Edward Scissorhands" (1990), back when Depp was a TV heartthrob ("21 Jump Street"), who had left that show in search of a serious career and found Burton willing to roll the dice.

The two men secured the relationship with the sublime "Ed Wood" (1994), in which Depp revealed a fine flair for comedy within that beautiful movie star face, and the bond between outcast hipsters Burton and Depp was deepened.

Burton would use Depp again in "Sleepy Hollow" (1999), but Depp wasn't then considered bankable by Hollywood. "Pirates of the Carribean" changed all that, and by the time Burton offered Depp "Willy Wonka," the studios were fine with it, indeed eager FOR it.

"Sweeney Todd" is the fifth Burton-Depp collaboration. There will surely be more. To Depp's credit, he turned one Burton picture down -- the ill-fated "Mars Attacks!" (1996), which was special in its own weird, failed way. To Burton's credit, he figured Depp was wrong for the All-American astronaut lead in "Planet of the Apes" and gave it to Mark Wahlberg.

Like Woody Allen before him, Tim Burton has a penchant for using his girlfriend steadily in his movies. For awhile, that girlfriend was the hip, offbeat model Lisa Marie, who turned up in Ed Wood (perfectly cast as "Vampira" the TV host), Mars Attacks, and Planet of the Apes.

But on Planet of the Apes, Burton used the notable British actress Helena Bonham-Carter, and suddenly Burton had a new girlfriend, and she's been in his movies ever since (including "Big Fish," another one WITHOUT Depp, I don't know why.)

Carter was rather "around the edges" in previous Burton films, but with "Sweeney Todd's" offbeat British female lead, how could Burton say "no" to her? And thus, the leads of "Sweeney Todd."

Casting Borat was one of those "strokes of box office genius" but all parties concerned made the wise decision not to advertise it much. He's testing the water here (I found his Italian barber redolent of Bugs Bunny, his package amusingly on display in his tight suit, and his actual British accent interestingly employed.

And Alan Rickman is, well, Alan Rickman. High on our list of best British villains, and abosolutely iconic from "Die Hard" (a movie that is as much his success as Bruce Willis''.)

I thought "Sweeney Todd" was great.

Depp's bag of tricks (British accent, facial beauty, deadpan looks of timidity and owe) are about played out in terms of surprising us, but he has the innate qualities of a great movie star. We won't be getting tired of him soon.

This is clearly Burton's Hammerized vision of the decades-old Broadway material, and clearly the goriest mainstream musical ever made. The slashing of throats, broke-neck tumbling of bodies, and reality of human meat pies(toe in there! Lawsuit!) are all too literal here. It's "Rodgers and Hammerstein's Hostel." But what better musical for our ever more violent times?

The singing was OK, for after all, its not like this musical has too many sustained "songs." Its really just a matter of the actors taking their voices up a notch -- and bringing in some unknown young ringers to carry the more difficult tunes. Meanwhile, Depp and Rickman on "Pretty Women" is a pretty tantalizing mix of the poignant and the hyper-suspenseful, as Johnny lathers up the blade for Rickman's waiting throat.

How 'bout a shave?