There's a hole in the world like a great black pit, And it's filled with people who are filled with shit...

Most of the time it’s quite reassuring to discover that some people know you very well. Like warm milk, episodes of sitcoms you’ve watched too many times and PG Wodehouse it’s sort of comforting. Mostly. At other times, however, it can be a smidgen embarassing. Like last night. Sitting in a darkened cinema watching the possibly batshit crazy Helen Bonham Carter onscreen in Sweeney Todd I was distracted by the lovely Alley Cat leaning over to whisper something to me. “You want that hat and her entire outfit, don’t you,” she said.
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Indeed that had been exactly what I was thinking at the time. Shit.

My slightly shameful penchant for awesome hats and raggedy black outfits that are one part old school madam and one part I-might-bake-people-into-pies aside I thought Sweeney Todd was brilliant.

Unsurprising, perhaps, given my undying fondness for everyone involed (let's all just pretend the remake of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory never happened, shall we?) perhaps but probably also helped along by some mixed reviews flying around the place, which had suitably lowered my expectations. So I was ready for Alan Rickman’s pretty dire “singing” and the occassional song that needed to be put out of its misery and ignored/sniggered at them accordingly.

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What I wasn’t ready for was the truly awesome cinematography, gorgeous gorgeous colours and Johnny Depp’s brilliant brooding. Oh, sure maybe (to bastardise the famous quote about Marily Monroe by someone whose name escapes me) saying Johnny Depp is good at brooding is a bit like saying a midget is good at being short but my God he is good at it. And forget his awesome razors – he could shave his customers with those cheekbones. Plus, revenge plots, like cupcake icing, satay tofu and SSB are simply delicious - Sweeney Todd is really, effectively, The Count of Monte Christo with better clothes. And singing.

So from now on my standards for determining whether a movie is good or not will involve one simple question: Can it present me with a gruesome twosome plotting to murder kiddies and bake randoms into pies and still leave me come out whistling a jaunty june? Well... can it?