The first trailer for the Johnny Depp led Dark Shadows flick has an official trailer, for you to view and then comment on for the world to see.
In the year 1752, Joshua and Naomi Collins, with young son Barnabas, set sail from Liverpool, England to start a new life in America. But even an ocean was not enough to escape the mysterious curse that has plagued their family. Two decades pass and Barnabas (Johnny Depp) has the world at his feet—or at least the town of Collinsport, Maine. The master of Collinwood Manor, Barnabas is rich, powerful and an inveterate playboy…until he makes the grave mistake of breaking the heart of Angelique Bouchard (Eva Green). A witch, in every sense of the word, Angelique dooms him to a fate worse than death: turning him into a vampire, and then burying him alive.
Two centuries later, Barnabas is inadvertently freed from his tomb and emerges into the very changed world of 1972. He returns to Collinwood Manor to find that his once-grand estate has fallen into ruin. The dysfunctional remnants of the Collins family have fared little better, each harboring their own dark secrets.
Matriarch Elizabeth Collins Stoddard (Michelle Pfeiffer) has called upon live-in psychiatrist, Dr. Julia Hoffman (Helena Bonham Carter), to help with her family troubles. Also residing in the manor is Elizabeth’s ne’er-do-well brother, Roger Collins, (Jonny Lee Miller); her rebellious teenage daughter Carolyn Stoddard (Chloe Moretz); and Roger’s precocious 10-year-old son, David Collins (Gulliver McGrath). The mystery extends beyond the family, to caretaker Willie Loomis, played by Jackie Earle Haley, and David’s new nanny, Victoria Winters, played by Bella Heathcote.
10 Comments
I guess this is one way to capture the strangeness of the stories and the gawkiness of live action [instead of visible microphones and electrical equipment, we have open camp]…. And I suppose this is the antidote to the overly-earnest television reboot of years ago.
But….?!!?
I don’t know . . . I really liked this trailer. I was almost completely turned off by the photos of Depp as Barnabas, but this campy 70’s setting works for me, while the quirky premise reminds me of Burton’s work on”Beetlejuice”
The only problem is that, save for the origin of Barnabas Collins, this trailer has almost NOTHING in common with the gothic soap.
From what I remember of the original show (yes, I am that old) that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Anytime Burton and Depp get together I’m in. The Lone Ranger?….uh, hell no.
I’m afraid I only remember tuning into the show now and then on Sci-Fi Channel reruns (back when it was actually called the Sci-Fi Channel). But I’m not sold on Burton and Depp. Part of this looks like good Burton/Depp team-up, like Edward Scissorhands and Sleepy Hollow, and then some of this looks like its trying too hard, i.e. “Alice in Wonderland”.
I liked it, too. I dont know a thing about the show, but I have to admit, funny’s funny.
I don’t think I’ve ever been more let down by a movie trailer. It’s depressing. When I think of what could have been… and it ended up getting the “Starsky and Hutch” treatment. And now, like “Wild Wild West,” I am unlikely to see it done with respect. I think I am most annoyed by what little I see of Willie Loomis. Fridiculous!!
I am appalled by the trailer. My mother grew up watching the show and I watched the Revival back in 91 and the reruns on Sci-Fi and all I could do was facepalm and scream. They made it a farce and a comedy, instead of a dark horror. Oh well, seems like everything Tim Burton touches tends to be a farce, look at Willie Wonka, I found that atrocious, and I never watched Alice cause it just exuded horridness. I am totally not looking forward to this abomination.
You know, I thought his version of Wonka looked like it’d be horrible, but I have to admit (if you view it just as an adaptation of the book) it wasn’t that bad. Having said that, I have to say I’m confused by the tactic used here.
The idea of repurposing a property is that you don’t have to do as much to brand it. It’s already in the marketplace, so you can capitalize on the current fanbase. But this looks like they deliberately decided they honestly don’t care about those fans (and, if we’re going to be honest, the fanbase is so small, why should they?).
But if you don’t care about a tiny fanbase that won’t make or break the movie anyway, then why make it at all? Why not just make some random movie and call it “Black Silhouettes” or something?
Well this is just sad…I hadn’t expected an overly serious movie, but I hadn’t expected a pure Starsky and Hutch style camp movie either. I was hoping for gothic dark with Burton/Depp version of quirk. As a part of the rabid fanbase that loved the original tv series, I really didn’t want to see a pure mockery done of it. Didn’t have to be overly serious and dark, but couldn’t it have been more of an homage? This went from something I was going to see opening weekend to waiting for it to show up on Netflix…
I’ve had an important learning experience with this trailer. I never watched the original, just like every kid has never seen a real episode of any of the 70’s shows I’ve seen. Normally I get super pissed off when they massacre and reanimate those shows, except for the ones that were pretty silly anyway( Dukes of Hazard already was silly) but I enjoyed this trailer and I might see this one. I enjoy the Beetlejuice style thing. So, I guess I should stop being so irked at the kids. I am so sorry for the fans of the show, though. If they did this to Trek or something( well, they kinda did) I’d be bitter.