Watching both Sweeney Todds (that is, the ones with Johnny Depp and George Hearn, respectively), I was surprised to find I preferred the new movie. It's an odd thing, since I liked the 2007 movie inordinately when I first saw it. I was wholly unfamiliar with the Broadway show and had, in fact, not yet had any unambiguously positive interactions with Stephen Sondheim. But as I learned more about the show I found I disliked almost every difference I learned of between the movie and its source.
I started writing at length about my preference of the one over the other, but I realized it was a bit silly of me. First of all, there's no accounting for the 80s. More to the point, it's hardly fair to compare a Hollywood film to a filmed stage production, any more than it would be fair to judge the movie based on a live reenactment by Johnny Depp and friends. I'm comfortable confessing that I will never have a truly informed opinion about live theater performed before I was born.
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