Les Miserables - version 2012

So my favourite musical - yes I'm into musicals, I enjoyed Joel Schumacher's Phantom of the Opera, get over it  - is coming to the big screen (not for the first time) by director Tom Hooper who made big awards pleaser The King's Speech.

 Watching this new trailer I have high hopes, it looks strange (oddly enough) not set on a stage and with what looks like a fairly big budget. The cast includes Hugh Jackman and Russell Crowe, who both sing as well as act in their spare time, as well as Anne Hathaway, Sacha Baron Cohen and Helena Bonham Carter; it's fair to say this is a good line-up. All the actors sing their own vocals live on set whist performing, which is quite impressive when comparing it to singing separately in a studio.

Probably not a film many will be excited about, but I certainly am. Les Miserables is released on January 11 2013.

Dark Shadows

Okay, so I have to say that I thought this film was complete garbage. I can't really delve into the plot as I'm still slightly unsure of what this was. I know the film was based on an old TV show, Depp is a vampire who is unearthed after 200 years in the ground and moves back in with his family descendants, this now taking place in the 1970s. Is that correct? I hope so.

The plot was my problem with this film - it was all over the place. One thing seemed to be happening at one moment then another completely different plot thread would occur a second later, with no relation between them. I also thought that the characters were extremely wooden, and pointless. I admit I wasn't paying much attention at the start (or much more for the remainder of the film) but Eva Green's character seemed to come out of nowhere, and Helena Bonham Carter again just served no purpose...everything just seemed like filler for another Burton/Depp vehicle. The script was also dire, the lines were so obvious and the attempts at humour just weren't funny.

I'll give it one thing though, it looked damn pretty. The costumes, make-up, lighting, cinematography...all of that were a delight to look at.

Overall...a complete disappointment. I'm a big fan of Burton's early work, and even enjoy his more recent productions such as Sweeney Todd and Alice in Wonderland, but for me this was just awful.

1/5 (for the aesthetic aspect)