Tim Burton’s SLEEPY HOLLOW Now, honestly, how could one really end such a great season of spook and ghouls on screen? Well, I’ve talked about plenty of the classics this month, so I’m going with a retelling of a tale as classic as any Halloween icon, done by one of my favorite directors. Desperate to prove his scientific mind and deduction skill are more solid methods to solve crimes, Inspector Ichabod Crane is sent to the small village of Sleepy Hollow to investigate a series of beheadings, in which the headless corpses are left and the heads collected. Once there, Crane is an odd sort amongst simple country folk but soon is enchanted by the lovely Katrina Van Tassel (who may have her own secrets to withhold). He also finds himself the unintended (and pretty unsuitable) guardian of the orphaned son of a beheading victim. However, it becomes apparent, even to Ichabod after a point, that the murders are being conducted by some far more otherworldly force (namely the headless Hessian soldier of legend). Now, let me go into a little backstory: SLEEPY HOLLOW came right at the point where Burton was at a career and personal low. He had done MARS ATTACKS, an odd movie that really satisfied neither director nor audiences, and had undergone a year of preproduction hell from the legendary unproduced film SUPERMAN LIVES. After coming across the script by Andrew Walker (of SEVEN fame), Burton found an outlet and created the first of what would become a string of remakes and adaptation for pretty much the first decade of the 21st Century. When I first heard of this movie, the idea of Tim Burton doing something with this iconic story, I thought it was genius (I would think the same of his take on ALICE IN WONDERLAND, but ultimately, was left with more downbeat results). One of the first things I knew immediately when I first saw this movie was that Burton must’ve had a blast with this film: it’s easily one of his most energetic films (as well as one of his most detailed looking films; its scenes and production easily screams both Burton and classic Hammer Gothic). I especially love the action in this film, which is used sparsely, but when used, it gets the full out treatment. I also love the Hammer film homages (the whole look of the movie, the Christopher Lee/bat wings image, the dark saturations of the sets and costumes, the really bright thick blood shots), which are scattered throughout. After using Depp in two iconic roles, Burton teamed up with him for the third and honestly, the last “good” collaboration (although yea, I still like his performance in SWEENEY TODD). The big thing about Depp playing Crane was that he mentioned often in interviews he based the character as a teenage girl (which I always thought was a weird analogy), but in a weird way, that kind of description really describes a Victorian Age Gentleman type who, in good Ichabod Crane style, freaks out at the first sign of dark magic. However, what Depp really does well here is with the comedy. Every time I saw Crane try to be heroic or take charge and always failing, it always got me laughing. However, it also proved one of the first of those moments where Depp really got into the weird character aspects in movement and ascents (which unfortunately has gotten really grating over the years). Here, it ended up working. I also thought it was long overdue that one of my favorite actresses Christina Ricci would eventually team up with Burton (as a blonde no less, which Ricci plays off far better than Ryder’s blonde in SCISSORHANDS, which always seemed weird). For the most part, Ricci does a good performance, but after a certain point, I thought the character was being used far too much as a McGuffin, and ultimately ends up playing the damsel way too often. In addition to the two leads, I also loved the small roles given to some classic Burton players (my favorite being Michael Gough, who sadly doesn’t have many scenes). It was also a great surprise and probably one of the most unique casting choices to have Christopher Walken playing the Hessian soldier that would become the Headless Horseman (proving the character was just scary, head or not). However, as Brom Bones, Casper Van Diem really didn’t work for me. I never got that great “boastful” vibe from him physically. Plus, I never liked the character really had nothing to do with the story and is eliminated quickly (always wished the character had proved more villainous). The biggest flaw SLEEPY HOLLOW had for me is really the mystery. The way Walker wrote the script really didn’t work at a certain point as a mystery: characters really started spouting off exposition dialogue, which for me is always bad if you can point that out really quick: more subtlety is needed, at least for me. The best thing I liked story wise was how many of the more “mystical” elements are placed in, like the “witch” moments that you think is just there for a jump, but it works out in different ways I didn’t expect. Also, like I said before, I loved the sillier moments which often involved Depp. So, yea, this is definitely a “reimagining”, as Burton would start calling these “remakes” or “adaptations”, of the classic Washington Irving story, but for the most part, it spells Halloween for me easily, apart from the detours from the original characters and plot. It would also be one of the last pure “Burton Style” films from Burton until later on in the decade with films like CORPSE BRIDE and FRANKENWEENIE (of course, all animated films). Some may call it silly and a bit contrived (concerning the mystery, I can’t blame them), but for me, it’s a great gothic tale to watch this Halloween.
Posted on: Fri, 31 Oct 2014 03:29:59 +0000