I’m not sure why they insist on making movie musicals. Especially musicals that are adapted from the Broadway stage. But I really don’t understand why Tim Burton wanted to adapt “Sweeney Todd.”

Even in a genre that is essentially ridiculous, “Sweeney Todd” sits on the edge. It’s a bloody, vengeance-fueled exercise in dramatic irony that is dark and dreary – except, of course, for Stephen Sondheim’s music and the occasional comic interlude.

In Burton’s hands, the comedy does come through. In fact, what kept me going throughout the film was Helena Bonham Carter– subbing for Angela Lansbury in the role of Mrs. Lovett – delivering the occasional bon mot.

Ultimately, though, the fact that no one could really sing, the story is so familiar (it resembles a cross between the basic plotlines of “Les Miserables” and “Phantom of the Opera”) and the free-flowing gore proves to be just too much.

“Sweeney Todd” the movie might have been directed by Herschell Gordon Lewis. With a tune or two thrown in just for, uh, fun.

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