The infamous story of Benjamin Barker, a.k.a Sweeney Todd, who sets up a barber shop down in London which is the basis for a sinister partnership with his fellow tenant, Mrs. Lovett. Based on the hit Broadway musical.
The movie may substitute Grand Guignol for laughs at times, but it's spectacularly stylized -- each throat-slashing exceptional -- persuasively sung, and imaginatively adapted for the screen.
– Bob Mondello,
NPR.org,
18 Oct 2008
fresh:
As unsettling as it is riveting. Even Sondheim aficionados will see the story with fresh eyes, unless those eyes are covered.
– Gail Pennington,
St. Louis Post-Dispatch,
18 Oct 2008
fresh:
A considerable achievement even if, on balance, it's more of a Tim Burton phantasmagoria than a Sondheim fantasia.
– Peter Rainer,
Christian Science Monitor,
18 Oct 2008
fresh:
This is grand-scale studio-work at its most beguiling.