October Challenge: Sleepy Hollow

Looking for a change of pace I stumbled on this little gem last night. I think Tim Burton is fantastic.

Sleepy Hollow (1999)

The story of Ichabod Crane and the Headless Horseman is one of the great American Horror stories.  The film versions though have to compete with the Disney classic version. This one is a worthy version.  Yes it takes a number of liberties with the story.  Yes it is exits in some weird Tim Burton alternate reality where all the leading men are played by Johnny Depp and all leading women are played by Helena Bonham Carter-er I mean Christina Ricci.
Ok so Depp's Ichabod is a detective for the NYPD in 1799.  He is sent to the village of Sleepy Hollow to investigate a murder.  His Ichabod is still a bit of coward and has a weak stomach, which I am glad they preserved, but is quite smart.  And apparently his mother was some sort of witch.
Christina Ricci is here and I'll be honest.  I think she is great, I love her in just about everything she does, but all her characters sound exactly the same.  Granted, I have not seen a lot of "Monster" but nearly everything else.
We get cameos and co-stars of some of the highest quality and number are (or will be) Burton alums.
I was particularly pleased to see Christopher Lee, Michael Gough, Martin Landau, and Michael Gambon.  Of course the award for biggest surprise casting goes to Christopher Waken as the Headless Horseman.
The actors are first rate and script is good too.
The effects looked a bit dated in some cases, even though it is only 10 years old, but still good enough.

I enjoyed the story in all it's supernatural spookiness. I think I was thinking that it was going to be a more mundane killer than a supernatural one, but instead we got both and that was kind of cool.

Tally 23 movies, 20 new.