If you’ve checked out the trailer for Tim Burton’s reboot of Dark Shadows, you may have noticed it doesn’t bear much resemblance to the gothic soap opera on which it was based.
And there’s a good reason for that. Burton tells the LA Times that while he enjoyed watching the show growing up, it’s “awful.”
“It’s a different animal,” Burton said. “If I go back and watch something like Star Trek, it’s not that hard to analyze what the appeal was, and even if the show is dated you identify what it was that made it work. The Dark Shadows appeal was a little more abstract. What I loved about it was the fact that it was a melodramatic soap opera, and, well, that flies in the face of any modern studio’s interests as far as moviemaking. But what we’ve gone for is a mixture, and that’s always what I’ve been interested in; I think most of my movies are mixtures of light and dark and serious things and things that have humor in them.”
As for making the film, Burton says that he went back to his roots with the film and instead of using a green screen to create the sets, he had the actual sets built on the Warner Brothers backlot.
“It’s a soap opera — or started as one — and that really means working with the actors. And the sets help everyone. And it’s just more fun,” he says.
I never liked the original Dark Shadows beyond a boyhood fascination with vampires, but what REALLY looks awful is the trailer for Burton’s film.
Never was able to get through an ep of Dark Shadows, but the issue I’m having with the re-imagining is mostly that it looks like Edward Vampirehands
He is such a delusionoid. ‘Most films need a mixture of light and dark’ he says, as if the film actually has artistic merit. Judging by the trailer, it doesn’t. Besides that, he hates the original, so why is he entrusted with the remake/parody. He is quite possibly the worst thing to happen to Hollywood. And considering how generally awful Hollywood has been since the late 90s, that’s saying something.