It’s
a dog eat dog world out there. Sweeney is in the position to hate the world for
being destructive to it’s self. He sees his urban society as one where people
must walk all over those below them. He has a valid reason for this view. His
wife and daughter were stolen from him in order to appease the very powerful
Judge Turpin’s want. This in turn, made Mr. Todd angry enough to kill everyone.
Is that okay? No, not really. But the audience understands his rage, and so we
can sympathize with him.
He
laughs at the world as he feeds them their comrades and/or enemies. They don’t
realize that they are stuffing their faces with human flesh just as they don’t
realize that they are stepping all over each other to get what they want out of
them. Adolfo Pirelli, the rock star barber, rips people off on some bogus
concoction disguised as a miracle elixir. But Todd catches his lie and
humiliates him in a shaving contest. He then proceeds to bash Pirelli with a
teakettle and then slit his throat when he tries to blackmail him. And so
Pirelli goes from the top of the food chain straight to a meat pie to be eaten
by the men he screwed over.
It
becomes hard to tell who the good guy is. It seems that everyone is bad. Judge
Turpin has to be bad because he stole Todd’s family away from him and condemns
small children to be hanged. Pirelli is bad because he lies, cheats, and
blackmails. Mrs. Lovett is bad because she bakes people into pies. Does this
make Todd good because he eliminates all the bad guys? It’s hard to say. I’m
going to go with no. Sweeney Todd is
a unique story because everyone one is a bad guy! The only good characters in
the movie are barely associated with the main story.
The
two lovers, Anthony and Johanna, have a story of their own. If I had to pick a
hero, it would be Anthony. He is a reminder that not everybody deserves to be
killed and eaten, but he seems to get caught up in the trouble caused by others,
so there is no escaping the cannibalism of the world.
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ReplyDeleteAlthough he is murdering tons and tons of people, the film Sweeney Todd makes the audience feel sympathetic towards the title character. I would lust for revenge if my wife and child were stolen from me. Benjamin Barker has led a pretty crummy life of exile which is made worse because he had a great life that was viciously taken from him. Tricking people to eat each other may be disturbing to the general population but some out Sweeney ends up the hero. He's still the good guy, I suppose, because he is a loving father and hopes to see his daughter again to save her from the life of misery he had. Of course what he's done is still wrong, but he had a good heart.
ReplyDelete-Skyllarr Trusty