Dark Shadows , the latest gothic oddity to be plucked from Tim Burton’s overactive imagination, has released a first official trailer. And from the looks of it, it could well be his best work in years.
Adapted from the cult TV show of the same name, the film sees Barnabas Collins (Johnny Depp) transformed into a vampire and buried alive by a jealous witch (Eva Green), before escaping his earthy tomb some 200 years later, and returning to his family home to meet the ancestors.
Anyone expecting one of Burton’s gloomier fables will be surprised however, because it’s at this point that the tone takes a dramatic swing for the comedic. “Here me future-dweller,” barks Depp at a terrified looking Jackie Earle Haley, “What is the year?” “1972” comes the reply as Superfly kicks in.
Take a look at the new trailer below…
It all looks very promising to us, with Depp making the most of the fish-out-of-water funnies (“Reveal yourself tiny songstress”) and Eva Green vamping the place up as the sexiest witch to grace the big screen in many a year.
Throw in a brilliant supporting cast including the likes of Michelle Pfeiffer, Chloe Moretz, Johnny Lee Miller and Helena Bonham Carter and the sense that we’re in for a treat grows even stronger. Dark Shadows opens in the UK on 11 May 2012.
