Little Shop of Horrors (1986) Review
I'm going to be honest: The first time I saw this movie I didn't really see that big of a deal over it. Sure, it was a PG-13 movie that blended horror, comedy, and musicality fairly well, but it didn't really work for me. Granted I had seen 2007's Sweeney Todd by then and realized this was the standard such a mixture had to live up to (unless, as I once mentioned, sarcastic horror is still meant to be a thing) by now. However, these were the 80s, nonetheless, the decade that still gave us Hughes, Spielberg, Zemeckis, Barker, Carpenter, Lynch, Scott, Craven, and even Cameron in their prime if not their best, so I still had some kind of expectations. And then the obvious hit me for both better and worse: the original ending and why. To make a long story simple there was an original, darker ending to this film which test audiences scrapped. Although I get that I didn't even exist in that decade and shouldn't be one to judge, not only would this ending have fitted better with the overarching feel of the movie's plot I also would've loved it more. From the emotional heft this film carried by seeing its already unhinged darkness to the bitter end to the production values that such a ridiculous yet epic length takes them, the ambition in this ending was ten times better synced than the version which plays it safe (even if, at the potential cost of spoiling, winks at us long enough to see a middle finger tattooed over the eyelid). But that's really as far as it goes, and most remember the original fondly anyway, so it is what it is.