Section: Movie reviews
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Sept. 28, 2005, 9:41AM ANIMATED WHIMSICAL ROMANCESay 'I do' to Corpse BrideGo to showtimes
By BRUCE WESTBROOK Copyright 2005 Houston ChronicleAmazingly fluid and drop-dead gorgeous, Tim Burton's Corpse Bride is the best-looking stop-motion animation film ever. Computer animation may have been easier � and just as good-looking � but regardless of its medium, the film is worth an "I do."
Directed by Burton and Mike Johnson from a script based on a Russian fairy tale, Bride is set in Victorian England. Tentative, sweet Victor (voiced by Johnny Depp) and gentle, sweet Victoria (Emily Watson) are about to wed, their marriage arranged by her heartless parents to reverse faded fortunes. Though strangers, Victor and Victoria seem right for each other. But there's a hitch to their getting hitched: Victor keeps blowing his vows during rehearsal. Practicing alone at a cemetery, he inadvertently weds cadaverous Emily (Helena Bonham Carter), who claws from her grave to take his ring.
Warner Bros.
Victor Van Dort (voiced by Johnny Depp) and Emily � the Corpse Bride � (voiced by Helena Bonham Carter) are wed in Tim Burton's Corpse Bride. |
This sparks a spry tale of comic complications, adorable grotesqueness and surprising emotional depth. Victor eases from shocked horror to tender acceptance of his bride's weird world of skittering skeletons and cavorting corpses, who are ostensibly spirits, not corporeal zombies. Their lively afterlife lies in colorful contrast to the gray coldness of Victor's town. Yet he's torn about ditching Victoria for his pitiable bride, who in life had been murdered just before her wedding. Bride's whimsical gloom and twisted gothic bent are in much the same vein as Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas, which he produced. As co-director, he makes Bride more personal, starting with the casting of Bonham Carter, his girlfriend and mother of his 2-year-old son. Songs by Danny Elfman and Mike Adams are routine, their lyrics often unintelligible. But the characters enchant and enthrall, from Victor's unearthed childhood dog, a tail-wagging skeleton called Scraps, to a nosy worm (Enn Reitel) in the Bride's head, sounding like Peter Lorre when he says, "If I hadn't just been sitting in it, I'd say you lost your mind." That's not to mention such potent voice actors as Christopher Lee, Joanna Lumley, Albert Finney, Michael Gough and Tracey Ullmann. Villainy is overstated, from Victoria's icy parents to a predatory suitor (Richard E. Grant) who would twirl a mustache if he had one. But the leads couldn't be more lovable, especially the woeful, wispy bride. Wearing a tattered gown and clutching dead flowers, she's an adorable wretch, even as her unruly eye plops out. All she wants is love, and all she sees is a bleak eternity of loneliness. "Can a heart still break once it's stopped beating?" the film asks, and our grave answer is yes. A warped wedding awaits, and you are urged to dig it. bruce.westbrook@chron.com
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Tim Burton's Corpse BrideMovie Type
Action/Adventure, Animation, Comedy MPAA Rating
PG
for some scary images and action, and brief mild language Running Time
74 minutes Directed By
Mike Johnson, Tim Burton Cast
Albert Finney, Emily Watson, Helena Bonham Carter, Johnny Depp, Richard Grant Written By
Caroline Thompson, Michael Cohn, Pamela Pettler Produced By
Laurie Parker, Tim Burton Released
Sep 23, 2005
(Nationwide) Distributed By
Warner Brothers Official Web Site |
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