Sweeney Todd

[Imaginary Light]

Originally Posted by jekylljuice

I've already left one of my miniature, amateur reviews for this film in the Last Movie You Watched thread. I do, however, have a couple of very specific questions which I thought I was probably better off asking here.

For anyone who's familiar with the original stage musical:

Spoiler Below

What becomes of Anthony and Johanna? One of my only real qualms with this film was that these characters never received any closure at the end, which was kind of a shame since I'd been rooting for them so ardently throughout. I can understand why they opted to end as they did, with Sweeney slowly expiring beside the body of his wife, but there was still something which felt slightly amiss as a result. From what I can make out, the stage version has Anthony and Johanna running in with the police in the aftermath of the final slaughter, though I did question the wisdom of them mixing with the law, given that they are technically fugitives. Either way, are we to take it that things ended happily for them?

This one is more of an observation than a question as such:

Spoiler Below

I thought it was interesting that Mrs. Lovett finally suffered a more brutal and agonising death than Mr. Todd himself...well, not that I'd know from personal experience, but I would have thought that being burned alive would have been a much more terrible way to die than having one's throat slit. Do you take this to mean than the story wants us to view Lovett as a more morally bankrupt character than Mr. Todd himself, given that she was stringing him along with his terrible deeds for the sake of her own emotional gratification? Or do you think that the question of morals was more-or-less irrelevent in this story?

Well, thanks in advance to anyone who can satisfy my curiousity there.

Spoiler Below

In the original stage musical, Anthony and Johanna turn up in the basement with the law. That's...pretty much it though. It's still left pretty open in the original, albeit less open than in the movie though. I think it's really up to the viewer to determine if everything ended "happily ever after" for the lovers (I don't think it did, honestly. After all that the they had been through...it seems impossible to have a happy ending).

As for Mrs. Lovett's death being more brutal than Sweeney's...I just took the idea of having her burn alive to be the equivalent of what she was doing to all the victims. Sweeney sliced peoples' throats, so he died by having his throat sliced. Mrs. Lovett cooked the people into pies, so she dies by burning in her oven with the pies

[jekylljuice]

Originally Posted by Imaginary Light

Spoiler Below

In the original stage musical, Anthony and Johanna turn up in the basement with the law. That's...pretty much it though. It's still left pretty open in the original, albeit less open than in the movie though. I think it's really up to the viewer to determine if everything ended "happily ever after" for the lovers (I don't think it did, honestly. After all that the they had been through...it seems impossible to have a happy ending).

As for Mrs. Lovett's death being more brutal than Sweeney's...I just took the idea of having her burn alive to be the equivalent of what she was doing to all the victims. Sweeney sliced peoples' throats, so he died by having his throat sliced. Mrs. Lovett cooked the people into pies, so she dies by burning in her oven with the pies

Thanks IL, much appreciated.

Spoiler Below

The possibility of Mrs. Lovett's demise being "poetic justice" for her own complicity in Mr. Todd's extremely sinister practices did occur to me, only what really stood out for me is that she went through a lot more suffering than she'd actually put any of her victims through. They, after all, were all dead before she processed them, placed them into pastries and then into the oven. While I can see the appropriateness of her finally being incinerated alongside the fruits of her bloodthirsty labours, I guess I'd have to interpret that additionally nasty aspect of her demise as further emphasis of Sweeney's brutal and unforgiving nature. Prior to her death, I was half-expecting Tobias to intervene and try and save her, as he promised he would in his song, but then again why should he? She was all prepared to betray him to Sweeney.