Film Analysis: Sweeney Todd, Who is the Hero?

(Warning, this contains spoilers)

So a song (specifically "Johanna") from the movie/musical Sweeney Todd popped into my head and I couldn't get it out of my head, nor could I stop thinking about how multifaceted it is.  The story written is a magnificent one and gives me more appreciation for Stephen Sondheim who already is my favorite Broadway composer.  I've always liked him because after a while, I got tired of the same old kind of Broadway show with the sparkles and big cast numbers, basically most of Andrew Lloyd Webber's work.  I like something dark, something that is edgy, something that makes me think and Sonheim's work is almost always all three of those things and at minimum, just taking everything from a different, interesting viewpoint (such as Into the Woods).  But back to the big question, who is the hero of Sweeney Todd?

The Power of the Voice

The human voice is an extremely underrated instrument.  As a pure instrument, it may be the most versatile one we humans possess.  Yes, the guitar has many effects that people have used throughout rock music, but the human voice has been able to replicate many of those tones.  The voice can also imitate a bass, or the drums.  Add on the fact that it is the easiest method of conveying your story to your audience, you have a pretty versatile instrument.  I may have my biases because I have been a singer for a long time, but that just gives me more of an appreciation and understanding of what the voice can do.

Beatles Hate...?

I don't get some of the Beatles hate, especially from those that truly appreciate music.  I get some of the arguments why people don't like them, though I don't agree.  "They are overrated", "they are just pop music", "some of their stuff all sounds the same", "they are just not my style".  Those are all opinions and I respect other's opinions but any true connoisseur and student of music, how its made, and its history comes to respect the Beatles.  They undeniably have an enormous influence on music, arguably more than  any other band.  They pioneered in many of the things they did, down to even how they recorded.

Jimmy Stewart: Hollywood's All-American man

This is a tribute to Jimmy Stewart, the All-American man of Hollywood.  Throughout his career, he always played your classic protagonist.  Its hard not to love Jimmy Stewart because not only was he a great actor, but he played characters who it was often very hard to hate.  As an actor, he brought a great deal of Pathos to his roles and made them more sympathetic than they already were.  Its not by pure coincidence that his roles were always sympathetic, the passion and charisma he brought out in his roles just made you fall in love with every one of them. 

Pearl Jam: Undervalued Grunge

Well, forgotten may be a slightly exaggerated term but Pearl Jam often doesn't get their due when it comes to good Grunge music.  When people think of grunge now and when they talk about the innovation involved, its always Nirvana.  They were the first Grunge band to make it big but Pearl Jam was right on their heels.  Some will say that Pearl Jam would never sold as well as they did if it wasn't for Nirvana but its just not true. Nirvana definitely helped their popularity, but you cannot mention what grunge did without mentioning Pearl Jam or Nirvana.

Poem or Song? Part II

I decided to do a part II of one of the posts I had done some on, but only listed as a part I (because I wanted to do more on the subject).  To me, there is never a bad time to examine the poetic aspects in music.  Like poets, many musicians use the lyrics in their music as a sort of autobiography.

Modern Times

Youtube has a very nice selection of very good movies that can be watched off of it for free.  So I was looking for a specific scene from a Charlie Chaplin movie that is famous (from the movie City Lights) and saw in related videos something that said "Modern Times Part 1", so I was naturally curious.  Turns out they have the whole movie of Modern Times and I decided to watch it since I had never watched it all the way through.