Rating of
2/4
Don't Mess with a Woman's Heart!
MovieAddict - wrote on 09/22/12
Filled with the typical Burton-isms you'd expect, ghosts, curses, fog, ships, gothic architecture, Johnny Depp and jilted lovers. The film essentially focuses on Eva Green's Angelique Bouchard and her attempts to manipulate and force her way into the heart of aristocratic playboy Barnabas Collins, the scion of the Collins family who had crossed from Liverpool to the New World in the 18th Century, and through their fishing business amassed fame and fortune. But Barnabas' romantic indiscretion with her proves disastrous when he finds his own true love, Josette DuPres. Bad move, since the servant girl is also a witch. Angelique in an act of jealousy puts a spell on her rival, forcing her to jump from 'Widow's Peak' and then proceeds to kill his parents. Baranbas meanwhile is cursed to live out the rest of his life as a vampire and to make matters worse, the jealous Angelique then turns the town against him, and he is buried alive in a chained coffin.
Fast forward some 200 years later he is awakened by construction workers and he heads back to his former home Collinwood. Upon arrival he meets his dysfunctional descendants; Elizabeth Collins-Stoddard (Michelle Pfeiffer), her daughter Carolyn (Chloe Grace Moretz), Elizabeth's brother Roger (Jonny Lee Miller) and his son David as well as David's psychiatrist Dr. Julia Hoffman (Helena Bonham-Carter) who craves youth and drink. He quickly realizes that in 1972 things are very, very different, and he struggles to fit in modern society.
Baranbas's priority is to bring back the glory of his family history but he soon discovers that the woman who started out as a maid, has moved up in the world and founded a company that has driven the Collins family to the edge of bankruptcy. Angelique is obsessed with power at any cost and it gets even better now that she has a new rival in the form Victoria (Bella Heathcote) who recently moved to the castle as a governess to David and caught Barbanas’s eye with her uncanny likeness to his beloved Josette.
Michelle Pfeiffer is great as the matriarch, leading to some quality scenes with Eva Green. Speaking of Green, she is one of Burton's finest vampish woman and she shines in this film too. In the end Dark Shadows is not as funny nor as scary as Burton's finest. Nevertheless it's enjoyable mostly due to the costuming, cinematography and Depp's uncanny ability to pull all these elements together and give us a comedic and enjoyable character we cannot help but like.
