Claudio Carvalho In the Nineteenth Century, in London, the barber Sweeney Todd (Tod Slaughter) invites lonely and wealthy costumers in the port to his barbershop on the nearby Fleet Street and murders them to take their money, while his associate Mrs. Lovatt (Stella Rho) and owner of a bakery below is barbershop gets rid off the bodies. Sweeney uses his fortune to help the fleet owner Stephen Oakley (D.J. Williams) with the intention to force his daughter Joanna (Eve Lister) to marry him. However, the beloved Joanna's boyfriend Mark Ingerstreet (Bruce Seton) returns rich from his last voyage and Sweeney decides to kill him and steal his fortune in pearl, making Mrs. Lovatt jealous with the situation.The original "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street" is a dark and macabre tale of greedy. It is funny to see only insinuation of cannibalism and that Mrs. Lovatt is the lover of Sweeney Todd. Pearly questioning how Sweeney Todd gets rid off the bodies of his victims while eating one of Mrs. Lovatt's pies is hilarious. Tod Slaughter performs a great villain, but the conclusion with Sweeney returning to the barbershop on fire to be defeated by Mark is weak. My vote is six.Title (Brazil): "O Diabólico Barbeiro de Londres" ("The Diabolic Barber of London")

FunkyDan Now, before I begin my review, I just want to say that I refuse to compare this to the 2007 version. They are completely different animals. In fact, most versions of the Sweeney Todd story aren't musicals. That being said, I saw this the other day and quite enjoyed it. I was expecting throat slitting considering the subject matter, but was surprised to see that Sweeney merely uses a trap door/chair combination. Now, the story itself is quite simple: Sweeney Todd is a barber who murders his customers for their money, and the woman who works next door to him, Mrs. Lovett, bakes the bodies into meat pies. Sweeney's just got a new apprentice, an orphan by the name of Tobais, who starts to wonder why every time Sweeney has a customer, he asks him to go downstairs for a meat pie. On top of this, Mrs. Lovett starts to realize that Sweeney's been taking all of their victims money before she arrives, leaving her without her deserved profit.While an enjoyable and sinister movie, this film suffered from one huge problem: Horrific sound quality. There was a horrible static every time someone spoke, making some of the plot and dialog hard to understand. As such, I couldn't really keep up with the subplot about Johanna and Antony. I probably would've rated this higher if not for this flaw. Overall, this is worth a rent, or a buy if you can find it for under $10.

chrismartonuk-1 Karloff aSt the Monster, Lee and Lugosi as the Count, Lon Chaney jr as the Wolfman, Cushing as the Baron and Tod as Fleet Street's most notorious barber! Certain horror stars are destined to be associated with certain roles and Mr slaughter would forever be identified with Sweeney Todd. Provincial theatregoers and the outlying suburbs of London could be guaranteed a welter of blood - or beetroot juice - whenever Tod came to town for a 2-week residency. By the 30's, he was established as a star turn, having British B films built around him - his old-school melodramas being mostly rewritten from their stage versions to prominently feature him - see Jeffrey Richards excellent article on Slaughter in the book THE UNKNOWN 30'S.Despite the distancing device of a prologue and epilogue in a modern barbers, the film holds up extremely well. The sailor's battle with the natives at Trader Patterson's shows the grasp of the film's budget exceeding its reach. But all the staples of Victorian melodrama are present - the villain, the hero and heroine, the older man (usually a disapproving Father of the heroine) and a comic couple. Modern day audiences may feel decidedly queasy about the film's maltreatment of Tobias Wragg. Threatened and intimidated by Todd, cheerfully guzzling down god-knows-what in Mrs Lovatt's pies and forced to wear the heroine's clothes - he must have grown into an adult certifiable for treatment. The ending is contrived with Johanna rushing - unconvincingly disguised as a boy - to Sweeney's barbershop and being left to perish in the flames as the villain covers his tracks. Even more unlikely is the way Sweeney stays to watch his emporium go up in flames instead of fleeing with his riches, then rushing in for an ill-advised fight with Jack Ingestre (who adopts a convincing Yorkshire accent for his farmer disguise). The tipping chair was adopted to prevent us actually seeing any throat slitting but it results in a suitably ironic finale as the unconscious Todd is despatched to the inferno below. There is now an official Tod Slaughter website so log on and lend your support to the greatest villain British acting ever produced.

MongotheDestroyer Sweeny Todd, for being as bizarre and crazy as it is, is very, very well made for the time, and for what I can only guess to be a somewhat limited budget. For that alone, George King deserves some sort of high recognition. The film is captivating and flies by as the viewer watches the tale of Sweeny, the homicidal barber. The movie has great comedic elements that show that the creators are not afraid to laugh at their own production a little bit. The aptly named Tod Slaughter does an amazing role as Sweeny Todd and has a creepy laugh that calls back to many an old silver screen sociopath. For a film that I got in a two-movie pack for fifty cents, I think I've certainly gotten a gem. Now, I best not take this gem to the local barber