Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street(2007)

Submitted by Julio M

Oscar winner: Best Production Design ; Oscar nominee: Best Actor (Johnny Depp), Best Costume

Short pooper:
Sweeney (Johnny Depp) kills “Pirelli” (Sacha Baron Cohen) -who turns out to be a former assistant of his, named Davey-, many unknowing patrons who become meat for Mrs. Lovett’s (Helena Bonham Carter) pies, Bamford (Timothy Spall), the beggar woman (Laura Michelle Kelly) -whom Sweeney later figures out is his wife Lucy, presumed dead before-, Judge Turpin (Alan Rickman) and, out of rage and spite, Mrs. Lovett herself for lying to him about Lucy being dead. He narrowly spares Johanna (Jayne Wisener), who manages to flee with Anthony (Jamie Campbell Bower). Toby (Ed Sanders) kills Sweeney.

Longer version:
At the height of Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett’s partnership, where he murders unsuspecting customers who come to his barbershop and them dumps them into the basement that leads to Mrs. Lovett’s bakery while she turns a blind eye to the situation and uses their corpses for meat, the mysterious beggar woman comments on the situation around the city -which many dismiss as rumors from someone crazy-. At the same time, Toby -whom Mrs. Lovett has taken under her wing as a surrogate son- comes across the bag that belonged to “Pirelli”, which makes him suspicious; he shares this with Lovett, but she locks him in the basement and tells Sweeney about it.

Meanwhile, Anthony has discovered the asylum where Judge Turpin had Johanna locked up and, pretending to be an wigmaker aide, manages to secure her release, with the intention to bring her to Sweeney’s shop; unbeknownst to him, though, Sweeney had Toby bring a letter to Bamford informing him about the ploy, with the intention to lure Bamford to the shop and kill him as part of his ongoing revenge. It works, as Bamford, who arrived wanting to investigate about the alleged stench coming through the chimneys, is duped by Sweeney to “have a shave”, which allows Sweeney to murder him and toss him below. Sweeney and Lovett look for Toby, but he has used the sewers to flee, especially after seeing corpses fall through the trap and finding human remains inside a meat pie.

Anthony brings Johanna to the shop, dressed up as a young man, and hides her in a chest while going to get Sweeney and, hopefully, a vehicle to run away afterwards. Shortly after, the beggar woman enters the shop -seen by Johanna from her hiding spot-. Sweeney comes in right behind and the woman, upon seeing him, surprisedly claims to know him. But then, when Turpin is heard on his way up, Sweeney kills her and sends her below, after which he convinces the corrupt judge “that Johanna will be arriving shortly” and to have a shave; while at it, Sweeney finally reveals to be Benjamin Barker and savagely murders Turpin, thus completing what he felt as his revenge against those who had wronged him all that time.

Johanna blows her cover and Sweeney, at this point, all but completely insane, not recognizing her as his own daughter, prepares to kill her too; but then, Lovett screams from the basement, which deters him and saves her life, allowing her to later escape with Anthony. Sweeney comes to the basement, where Lovett discloses that Turpin was still barely alive, seconds prior, and convinces him to just “forget about Johanna”. When he takes a much closer look at the corpse of the beggar woman, piled on top of all the others and fully illuminated by the oven’s fire, Sweeney realizes that was his wife Lucy: she didn’t die of poisoning all those years before, as Lovett claimed, but, instead, had a mental breakdown upon the destruction of her family and wandered the streets of London as a vagrant.

Lovett admits she knew, all along, that Lucy was alive, which infuriates Sweeney; more so, upon her claiming that she lied about it out of the pretense of loving Sweeney and hoping to “be a much better wife to him” and have him for herself. Feigning forgiveness, Sweeney grabs her and starts dancing and singing, spinning around maniacally until he violently tosses her into the fiery oven and shuts the hatch as she screams in agony and burns to death.

Heartbroken, Sweeney cradles his wife’s body; suddenly, Toby reemerges through the sewers and seeing what has happened, grabs Sweeney’s own sharp razor, approaching him from behind. Sweeney, however, does notice the boy’s presence and raises his head up -seemingly willing to die- as Toby slits his throat and departs. The movie ends with Sweeney bleeding to death over Lucy’s corpse.