Oh, the Horror!
Friends, I have a question. Has anyone of you already seen Tim Burton's new film Sweeney Todd with the delicious Mr. Depp playing the main character?
I'm asking because... um... blame it on the German TV programme - there has been a flood of Johnny Depp movies lately, and I watched them all. Chocolat, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (what is it with all the candy stuff?), The Astronaut's Wife, Sleepy Hollow... I've always liked watching films with him in it, admiring his good looks and his acting talent, but never he touched my soul (like a certain young actor with huge blue eyes...) that deeply that I would have called myself a "fan". Now I do. The last drop was apparently his portrayal of Ed Wood. Hubby presented me the DVD for christmas and this film is so utterly charming and touching, I couldn't help to develop finally a crush on Johnny. Or more precisely, I fell in love with several of his portrayed characters (and I don't mean necessarily Captain Jack Sparrow! It's a great role for him, but I like him better in the more restrained, tragic parts). He himself seems to be a decent and honest person and a real nice guy (if odd). I wish him happiness in his personal life, but it is his acting that got me eventually.
Sweeney Todd is scheduled for cinema release on 21st February here. I'm excited over the fact that I'm going to see Mr. Depp in a brand-new role, but am also anxious that *much* gory stuff will be included. While watching Sleepy Hollow recently, the incessant beheadings throughout the movie unnerved me quite a bit, although the effects are ridiculously over the top. But in general, I love Tim Burton's grim and often macabre sense of humour.
I'd not label myself the greatest wuss when it comes to horror movies though. In fact, I always liked films with a spooky atmosphere. I grew up with the Dracula films, made by the legendary Hammer Studios, starring Sarum-..., erh, Christopher Lee. Wasn't he a smart Count?
Pardon the somewhat awkward style, I was only 14 years old, when I made this portrait. Oh, those Hammer films! They were unbelievably gaudy. And I still have the hair-raising music in my ear.
I enjoyed the German Expressionist horror films as well, like The Golem, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari or Nosferatu; I just love the 1930's film versions of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Frankenstein and Dracula.
The 50's came up with impressive horror movies like The Fly, Tarantula or Formicula. Then, in the 60's, there were Corman's films, loosely based on Edgar Allan Poe stories, or the horrifying X (aka X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes); Hitchcock made the ultimate Horror film Psycho, ...
Another example of my early artwork. My style back then had improved a bit, I think.
...and filmmakers like Brian de Palma followed in his footsteps with films like Sisters and such. I even stomached some Cronenberg movies, Dead Ringers and The Fly (which I wouldn't want to watch ever again, but I was fascinated by it enough to draw the film's protagonist *before* he begins to mutate into an inhuman species...)
You see, I always have been fascinated by all those mad scientists, the madmen, the monsters. All of them tragic figures whose fates touched me deeply.
Jeff Goldblum as Mad Scientist in David Cronenberg's remake of The Fly.
That film was quite revolting, bleh, thank you very much! I'd rather recommend the Kurt Neumann film from 1958.
Splatter movies make me sick and I can't stand it when there is a sadistic attitude (that was what made Sin City unbearable for me - in large parts I found it simply sadistically in a sick sort of way).
I'm really curious how I will like this Sweeney Todd...