I just got done watching the Dark Shadows 2012 movie with Johnny Depp and, well, I'm not sure what to make of it. It is loosely based on the 1960s TV 'soap opera' drama of the same name and the remake in 1991 that lasted less than a year.
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The problem is that the movie doesn't know if it is supposed to be a horror movie, a drama, or a comedy. Is family patriarch Barnabas supposed to be a cold-blooded killer vampire or a cursed man who only wants to protect the family? By the end of the movie you still don't know the answer to that one. I can't see really young kids watching this as there are a couple of bloody murder scenes. Older kids will likely be bored by the pace of the move and the fact that the movie is set in 1972 with all of the music being from that period. Comedy fans get to see the the out-of-time Barnabas reacting to the modern world but not enough to sustain watching the whole thing. Horror fans get to see watered down horror elements but none of them are explored in detail. Drama fans get to see a doomed romance that spans across centuries but it is covered so quickly that you really don't feel empathy for them nor, really, any of the characters except for the young boy with the loser father.
If you are channel surfing and it is on then watch it if for no other reason then to see how movies based on TV shows do not always work out.
With Depp in the lead role and directed by Tim Burton it should have been a hit. Visually it harkens back to classic Burton & Depp movies like Edward Scissorhands and the cast includes Chloe Grace Moretz (Kick Ass), Michelle Pfieffer (Batman Returns), Helena Bonham Carter (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows), Jonny Lee Miller (Elementary), and Jackie Earl Haley (Watchmen). There is even a cameo by the horror movie icon Christopher Lee. In a bit of gimmick casting, rocker Alice Cooper makes an appearance as himself or, as Depps' character describes him, the "ugliest woman" he's ever seen (see, because his name is "Alice" and Barnabas doesn't understand...
).The problem is that the movie doesn't know if it is supposed to be a horror movie, a drama, or a comedy. Is family patriarch Barnabas supposed to be a cold-blooded killer vampire or a cursed man who only wants to protect the family? By the end of the movie you still don't know the answer to that one. I can't see really young kids watching this as there are a couple of bloody murder scenes. Older kids will likely be bored by the pace of the move and the fact that the movie is set in 1972 with all of the music being from that period. Comedy fans get to see the the out-of-time Barnabas reacting to the modern world but not enough to sustain watching the whole thing. Horror fans get to see watered down horror elements but none of them are explored in detail. Drama fans get to see a doomed romance that spans across centuries but it is covered so quickly that you really don't feel empathy for them nor, really, any of the characters except for the young boy with the loser father.
If you are channel surfing and it is on then watch it if for no other reason then to see how movies based on TV shows do not always work out.
