Post by Capo on Mar 8, 2010 23:52:43 GMT
Meh. Again.
I'll just copy the snippets I just wrote to a friend on Facebook chat:
It's more endurable than Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Sweeney Todd, but that's probably ONLY due to the source material being more Burton-friendly from the outset.
It's a bit non-commital. Visually ugly (I didn't see it in 3D) and erratic. Sloppy really.
It's quite formulaic really; the final act becomes a very generically-rendered small-scale Lord of the Rings-style good-vs-evil finale. Very ordinary - all LOTR imitations are.
I actually think Burton thinks too highly of his own humour, both in writing and in visual gags. And I don't think he's funny; I think that's the crux of the problem with most of his recent films.
There's a crude charm about his earlier stuff, like Beetlejuice, and he seems more suited to the dark rendition of silliness like the Batman films, but his recent stuff's shit.
[And, further non-copied thoughts:
There are certain things to like here. The brutal hypocrisies of social order that inhibit and oppress the minds and lives of children. Though I don't think Burton is any sort of brilliant visualist (how I long to see Svankmajer's version for comparison!!!), I do think the source material allows for a worthwhile endorsement of dwelling in one's creative imagination as a way of dealing with life's material pressures and cruelties - crucially, there's a refusal to bury oneself too deep here; it is after all a fable about becoming the maker of your own decisions, regardless of what arbitrary social fashions and traditions dictate to us. Burton to his credit doesn't neglect this. But the overall taste is again one of formal fascination... nothing wrong with that, particularly, except that Burton's formally ordinary and never anything more.]
I'll just copy the snippets I just wrote to a friend on Facebook chat:
It's more endurable than Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Sweeney Todd, but that's probably ONLY due to the source material being more Burton-friendly from the outset.
It's a bit non-commital. Visually ugly (I didn't see it in 3D) and erratic. Sloppy really.
It's quite formulaic really; the final act becomes a very generically-rendered small-scale Lord of the Rings-style good-vs-evil finale. Very ordinary - all LOTR imitations are.
I actually think Burton thinks too highly of his own humour, both in writing and in visual gags. And I don't think he's funny; I think that's the crux of the problem with most of his recent films.
There's a crude charm about his earlier stuff, like Beetlejuice, and he seems more suited to the dark rendition of silliness like the Batman films, but his recent stuff's shit.
[And, further non-copied thoughts:
There are certain things to like here. The brutal hypocrisies of social order that inhibit and oppress the minds and lives of children. Though I don't think Burton is any sort of brilliant visualist (how I long to see Svankmajer's version for comparison!!!), I do think the source material allows for a worthwhile endorsement of dwelling in one's creative imagination as a way of dealing with life's material pressures and cruelties - crucially, there's a refusal to bury oneself too deep here; it is after all a fable about becoming the maker of your own decisions, regardless of what arbitrary social fashions and traditions dictate to us. Burton to his credit doesn't neglect this. But the overall taste is again one of formal fascination... nothing wrong with that, particularly, except that Burton's formally ordinary and never anything more.]