Word: plot
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...story of Jesus Christ, countless audience members were overheard during intermission asking their companions concrete questions about the action of the play ("Who's that guy who keeps coming out and yelling?" "I think that's Judas..."). Whether or not the audience's competence at following the plot should be a consideration for the director, the fact is that many in attendance were reduced to a state of bewilderment...
...Those who want to revive their childhood reactions to this spooky but charming ghost story should rerent the Disney cartoon. Sleepy Hollow in Burton's hands is a darker, stranger, cheaper shade of horror. It's less clippety-cloppety, more blood-spattery. Irving's simple three-main-character plot gives way to a convoluted collection of Van Tassles and other conniving townspeople who sustain an even more convoluted chain of mysterious events for the investigative Ichabod to logically piece together. More of a saga and certainly scarier and gorier than the original tale, the film version maintains an oddly light...
...plot diverges markedly from the original, but one of the most notable differences from Irving's tale, and one that seems to yield further plot divergence, comes with Burton's casting of Johnny Depp as Ichabod Crane. The gawky schoolteaching Ichabod of the novel and cartoon becomes an incredibly attractive, law-practicing heartthrob. This Ichabod, as opposed to the weird-looking schlepp in the book, is squeamish but admirable, cowardly but endearing. And while he tries his hardest to temper his hunkiness by acting nevous and jumpy (which definitely elicits some giggles), Johnny can't help but be adorable. Depp...
...Created and catapulted to significance in this version, Lady Van Tassel, Katrina's stepmother, is played by Miranda Richardson. Marrying Van Tassel after nursing Katrina's real mother until her death, Lady Van Tassel yields a new twist to the plot. Richardson, for most of the movie, gives a fair, airy performance, but her final scene is beyond awful. Her monologue summing up the plot may be intentionally trite, but regardless, its a poor anticlimax. It destroys all the magic built up in the suspenseful buildup towards the conclusion. Aside from this last disaster Richardson is tolerable, providing a cool...
...even the trees bleed. If only to let the blood flow longer and more freely (even in one gratuitous scene, from the implied decapitation of a little boy), this version of Sleepy Hollow expands significantly and more disturbingly on the original. Irving's tale becomes entwined in a complicated plot of greed and corruption, a horrifying subplot explaining the psychological warping of Ichabod, and several impressive fight scenes in which the decapitations have an especially martial flare. (Star Wars fans may notice similarities between the headless sword-wielding skills and the light saber moves of Darth Maul in The Phantom...