went to see dark shadows with johnny depp last night, johnny likes dressing up incognito smoking a big spliff and going to watch his films, he and i looked like a pair of beatnik undertakers, both dressed in black and wearing strange sunglasses. apparently he had not seen the full movie yet although he'd been promoting it across the globe. he said, in his strange croaky voice, 'i've seen snippits of the film, but want to sit through a full screening,' i figured those comfy chairs that recline and you sink into may be the go but when we get to the cinema they have sold out, johnny suggests we just sit at the back somewhere indiscreet.
the movie starts of really well and i find myself laughing out loud at parts especially the lines barnabus gets to say as a response to the 1970's with depp absolutely stealing the whole screen from his co stars, he really is a brilliant actor, the style is very gothic soap opera, and johnny tells me 'dark shadows' was a early american soap that both he and tim watched as children and tim wanted to maintain some sort of relationship to the original, hence the waves breaking every scene change and the sudden dramatic bursts in the storyline, which actually work well in terms of style and narrative. however half way through the film, when a warehouse catches fire, the whole story takes a real dive and degenerates into something quite silly and uncomfortable to watch. i ask johnny why didn't some one tell tim about the fact his very good film suddenly becomes a car wreck and in his barnabus voice he says, 'the dear fellow was on rather a large amount of mind distorting flower extracts at the time.'
yes well the film is a 'car crash' descending into teeth grinding farce, chaos and debacle so on the way home i tell johnny that its best we part company as friends lest my credibility go to ruin even though he is was the star of my fave film, dead man. he's visibly upset but this is the way captain mission rolls these days, sorry johnny.