Tim Burton's films are oft anticipated for his boldly off-center and usually dark art direction. "Sleepy Hollow" is no exception. The warm colors have bled from the footage leaving the flesh stark, cold and clammy, and the darks -- soot black. Burton also enjoys painting a "small world" set with which to stage his sideways stories. Frequently, these worlds are neither live action looking nor quite animated. I find them cartoony, claustrophobic and distracting, but I'm probably one of only a handful; others seem to enjoy them.

Gadgetry, on the other hand, Burton excels in -- gadgetry and freakish characters. Ichabod Crane (Johnny Depp) wields coroner's tool that look as if they were designed for handicapped piranhas. And Burton's Headless Horseman is simply magnificent; it's the heart and soul (though not brains) that keeps this "Sleepy Hollow" charging mightily through the foggy twisted forest. This powerful black torso with limbs spinning sword and hatchet from atop a pounding steed is as splendid as a bolt of lightening from the heavens.

Unfortunately, sleepy and hollow all too appropriately describe the first half of the production (prior to any significant appearance of the horseman). Wrought with exposition and an elusively wry sense of humor giving even the artfully apt Depp a larger foe to over come than the one of high shoulders; the horseman charges on, breathing life (from it's severed esophagus) into this paling production.