Dark Shadows Reviews
Las Vegas CityLife
Burton really needed to lean his horror-comedy more toward horror. Instead, it's reminiscent at times of Love at First Bite and the feature film remakes of The Addams Family and The Brady Bunch.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/5
eFilmCritic.com
It turns into a bit of a mess towards the finish line, but at least it's a fun mess, and if you're looking to Tim Burton for narrative tidiness you must be thinking of another Tim Burton.
Full Review
| Original Score: 4/5
IGN DVD
Dark Shadows should have been a return-to-form for director Tim Burton, but with a bloated budget and way too much room to play, Burton delivers yet another wasted effort.
Full Review
| Original Score: 5/10
CinemaBlend.com
Made for an audience of no one, Dark Shadows is a mess of campy horror, "fish out of coffin" comedy, and gothic melodrama.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/5
ScreenRant
Not a colossal failure but an indicator that Burton and Depp could stand to step outside their collective me + you = cinematic magic mindsets.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/5
The Aristocrat
...following Graeme-Smith's lead, Burton has made, quite possibly, the worst film of his 30-year career.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/5
Shotgun Critic
Dark Shadows is never short on stunning backdrops and impressive cinematographic techniques. It looks a treat. But with Dark Shadows, like Depp himself, you can only put so much make-up on an ageing face and sell it as fresh.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/5
Movie Metropolis
It's just sort of a star vehicle for Johnny Depp, with everyone and everything else a secondary consideration at best.
Full Review
| Original Score: 5/10
Examiner.com
It had so much potential, but given the result, it should have stayed in the shadows.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/4
TheShiznit.co.uk
Dark Shadows really is just a mixed bag of chuckles and drama that never really gets the balance quite right.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/5
FoxNews.com
While "Dark Shadows" has many wonderful elements, it is set up to become a new franchise for Warner Bros, but it just doesn't quite have that eternal bite.
Full Review
| Original Score: 5/10
CraveOnline
Captures the grand sweep and often ridiculous theatricality of both soap operas and gothic romance.
Full Review
| Original Score: 8.5/10
Vue Weekly (Edmonton, Canada)
There's much more bloody potential here for dark comedy (and shaded emotions) than we're lightly spattered with . . . offers no zany flourishes, dashing touches or striking shots.
Ultra Culture
Dark Shadows makes almost no attempt to reward cinema audiences.
3AW
In yet another over-designed cinematic letdown, director Tim Burton (Alice in Wonderland; Sweeney Todd) weaves a choppy comic tale of resurrected ghouls set in the early 1970s.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/5
Film Experience
Burton can still deliver a great visual hook and whimsical comedy. But he seems caught between his new laziness and his old genuine excitement about filmmaking.
Full Review
| Original Score: C
Spectrum (St. George, Utah)
Isn't sure if it is supposed to be a campy homage, a vampire black comedy, or a family friendly horror pic...doesn't come close to the duo's wondrous collaborations.
Full Review
| Original Score: C+
Reel Times: Reflections on Cinema
Dark Shadows gets stuck in neutral because of the uncertainty as to what kind of a film it wants to be.
Full Review
| Original Score: C-
Washington City Paper
Burton deploys the kind of winking, sly humor he knows his leading man can pull off.
Scene-Stealers.com
Some scenes seem to exist in their own universe entirely, having no bearing on the rest of the plot. If this is supposed to be some sort of satirical comment on the original TV show, which was famously erratic, then it was a bad choice.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/4
