Tim Burton's Corpse Bride

Premise: After fumbling his vows at the wedding rehearsal, Victor (Johnny Depp) sets out in to the woods to practice. When he places the ring on what he assumes is a twig, he accidentally marries the Corpse Bride (Helena Bonham Carter) instead. Victor tries to get back to the land of the living, while his fiancée, Victoria (Emily Watson), appears increasingly insane when she tries to explain what has happened to Victor.

As you well know, I try to live spoiler free. In fact, unless it's to warn me off something so awful it approaches ancient Macedonian proportions, I don't want to hear it. All I want to hear from someone who sees something in the theatre before I get the chance is that they think I will like it.

So imagine my chagrin when two people who spread falsehoods about seeing the picture with Sarah and I, went to see it without us, and proceeded to bad-mouth the movie to our faces, despite my protests of "I don't want to hear this" and "Stop talking the movie." Personally, I think those a pretty clear statements. Unfortunately, it was not enough to shut one of them up.

Well, Emily and Andrea, you can just cram it with walnuts the next time you want to behave like insensitive clods. Or filberts. Those were also suggested.

Although I highly doubt it, gentle reader, in case you happen to be suffering a moron attack of Em/Andy proportions, this movie includes musical numbers much like every other animated feature you've ever seen. Five numbers do not a musical make. And since the numbers are so delightfully written and staged (I love you, Danny Elfman!), you really have no cause for concern. Instead, you have cause for delight.

Let me state for the record that the technical aspects of stop motion animation with puppets made out of stainless steel armatures covered with silicon skin are beyond me. Trust me when I say that the two foot puppets looked amazing, and that the opening town sequence alone puts the similar Beauty and the Beast one to shame.

Well, to gothic romance shame. I do love that Burton never seemed to grow out of that early adolescent obsession with all things dark, dusty, horrific, and sexual. He's a great guy, that Tim Burton. Just great.

He assembled a crack team of people he's collaborated with in the past: co-director Mark Johnson, and screenwriters John August, Pamela Pettler, and Caroline Thompson. They went to town in this gothic fairy tale of lost love and the underworld. How they managed to capture Depp's nervous nuances is truly phenomenal.

A delicious and hilarious take on marriage and love as a wedding gift for his lady muse, Burton has chosen once again to treat his audiences to something refreshing, clever, and adorably off the wall as well. Keep up the excellent work, Tim. A