Sleepy Hollow (1999) – Nostalgia Central

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The classic Washington Irving tale of a headless horseman who rides at midnight to terrorise a New York village of Dutch settlers in 1799 is a natural for Tim Burton.

The director of Batman (1989) and Edward Scissorhands (1990) gives his film the fine burnish of a Bruegel canvas, topped only by eye-popping visual effects – how did they get that headless rider to emerge from a tree trunk at full gallop?

From the moment Johnny Depp’s Byronic Ichabod Crane gazes into the swelling cleavage of Christina Ricci’s hot-to-trot Katrina Van Tassel (“Do you think me wicked?” she asks), the spindly schoolmaster and shy damsel of Irving’s tale are history.

Ichabod is now a forward-thinking big-city constable drawn to the sharp-tongued village heiress who helps him solve grisly crimes.

Frustrated by his insistence on using modern forensic science and autopsy techniques, Crane’s superiors in New York City banish him to the isolated, deeply superstitious Dutch hamlet of Sleepy Hollow.

Once there, Ichabod begins investigating a series of gruesome murders where the victims have all been found perfectly decapitated, with their severed heads completely missing.

While the terrified town elders insist the killer is the supernatural ghost of a bloodthirsty Hessian mercenary – the Headless Horseman – Crane remains determined to find a logical, human explanation.

To Irving, the horseman was merely a myth used by Brom Van Brunt (Casper Van Dien), a rival for Katrina, to scare off Ichabod.

To Burton. the crimes are dead serious: Heads roll, bodies pile up, and the horseman – played in flashback by a mega-weird Christopher Walken – rises from the dead.

Andrew Kevin Walker, who wrote Seven, turns Irving’s Sleepy Hollow into one fucked-up farm town, filled with adultery, theft, murder and witchcraft. It’s a Burton kind of place.

Like Batman. Depp’s Ichabod is haunted by images of a murdered parent (Lisa Marie). And Katrina suspects foul play in the death of her mother. Their shared emotional bruises give a centre to the swirling mayhem.

It helps that Tom Stoppard, an Oscar winner for Shakespeare in Love, did an uncredited polish of the script, and that Depp and Ricci bring sly wit and sexiness to the bewitched lovers.

Depp is at his heartfelt and hilarious best, revealing the frightened boy in the stern advocate of scientific reason. And Ricci is a firebrand, instilling ardour into a role that merely calls for her to be blonde and decorous, like Winona Ryder in Scissorhands.

Sleepy Hollow has been done as a cartoon and two live-action TV shows, but never like this. Leave it to Burton, inspired by the look of British scare flicks with Christopher Lee (who does a cameo) and his own feelings about isolation and loss, to make a lively art out of being alone in the dark.

Rather than shooting on location, the production built an entire, sprawling 18th-century village from scratch in Leavesden, England. The massive set included fully functional buildings, giving Burton absolute control over the fog, lighting, and gothic atmosphere.

The film was a significant box-office success, grossing over $206 million worldwide. It was highly praised for its technical craftsmanship, winning the Academy Award for Best Art Direction and receiving Oscar nominations for Best Cinematography and Best Costume Design.

Ichabod Crane
Johnny Depp
Katrina Van Tassel
Christina Ricci
Lady Van Tassel/Crone
Miranda Richardson
Baltus Van Tassel
Michael Gambon
Brom Van Brunt
Casper Van Dien
Reverend Steenwyck
Jeffrey Jones
Magistrate Philipse
Richard Griffiths
Doctor Lancaster
Ian McDiarmid
Notary Hardenbrook
Michael Gough
Hessian Horseman
Christopher Walken
Young Masbath
Marc Pickering
Lady Crane
Lisa Marie
Killian
Steven Waddington
Beth Killian
Claire Skinner
Burgomaster
Christopher Lee
High Constable
Alun Armstrong
Jonathan Masbath
Mark Spalding
Sarah
Jessica Oyelowo
Van Ripper
Tony Maudsley
Lord Crane
Peter Guinness
Glenn
Nicholas Hewetson
Theodore
Orlando Seale
Thomas Killian
Sean Stephens
Doctor Lancaster’s Wife
Gabrielle Lloyd
Dirk Van Garrett
Robert Sella
Spotty Man
Michael Feast
Thuggish Constable
Jamie Foreman
Young Ichabod
Sam Fior
Young Lady Van Tassel
Tessa Allen-Ridge
Young Crone
Cassandra Farndale