tim burton style essay

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What is Burtonesque — A Complete Tim Burton Style Analysis

T im Burton is a filmmaker with a style so unique that we’ve come to regard his works — and those who replicate them — as Burtonesque . And we see the Burtonesque in every facet of his films: writing, lighting, music, characters and of course, production design. We’re going to explore the Tim Burton style and his singular mise en scene with the purpose of better understanding expressive filmmaking. By the end, you might be inspired to create something equally audacious and bold.

Watch: Tim Burton Style — Set Design and Mise en scene

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Tim Burton Style Analysis

Elements of mise en scene.

If you’re unfamiliar with the term mise en scene , don’t worry – it quite simply refers to all the elements that go into making a visual image. For more on mise en scene, here's breakdown of how directors like Stanley Kubrick have mastered the elements of film-language.

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Perhaps no filmmaker knows how important mise en scene is more than Tim Burton . Mise en scene plays a huge role in creating mood (the feel of a story) and tone (the attitude of the artist). We can see the effects of expressive mise en scene everywhere in Burton’s best movies — and it’s largely responsible for how we feel about his film-worlds. Now let’s jump into Burton’s mise en scene by breaking down some of its most noteworthy elements.

Who is Tim Burton and How Does He Write?

How to write light and dark stories.

Tim Burton isn’t so much of a screenwriter as he is an idea conceptualizer. In fact, nearly all of Burton’s writing credits are for story/character conceptualization, not screenwriting.

So, what can we learn from the Tim Burton aesthetic of dreaming up film worlds? Well to understand the Tim Burton style of filmmaking and story-conceptualizing, we have to go back to the beginning.

In the early 1980s, Burton began working at Walt Disney Studios as an animator. Two years later, he directed his first official short titled Vincent — which was a sort of autobiographical ode to Edgar Allan Poe and Vincent Price.

V incent  is a foundational piece in establishing the Tim Burton art style and one of the best short films of all time . Considering this, let’s review the short film by paying special attention to detail for story conceptualization. 

Tim Burton Art Style Takes Off in Vincent

What do you think of the Tim Burton style of filmmaking here? Personally, I think Vincent is a perfect example of the best aspects of what you might call a “Tim Burton writing style.” Vincent is actually based on a poem by Burton in the style of a Vincent Price monologue . 

The content of the poem is full of things we’ve come to expect from Burton’s works; such as a focus on existential dread, ghoulish monsters, and the macabre. Although it’s somewhat impossible to do, I suggest you try to imagine Burton’s works without any visuals at all. That’s the first step in understanding all the best characteristics of Tim Burton films.

Style Tim Burton’s World

The art of contrasting design.

Naturalistic Tim Burton Set Design

The American suburbia Tim Burton aesthetic is defined by bright and bold colors, as well as 1960s architecture and cars. It stands in stark contrast to Burton’s theatrical side, which is defined by Gothic overtones and mechanical machinations and heavily inspired by German Expressionism .

Theatrical Tim Burton Set Design in Edward Scissorhands

Both sides of the “Tim Burton design style” are exaggerated — but they’re diametric to each other. I suppose it’s true that contrast is king when highlighting differences between two sets; a point proven by Edward Scissorhands . 

When thinking about ideas for designing your own sets , consider how Burton uses the naturalistic side in an ironic sense to suggest “this is where the true villainy lives.”

Tim Burton Style Analysis of Lighting

How to light a scene like burton.

Film lighting is a vitally important aspect in creating the atmosphere of a scene. Oftentimes, lighting is the difference between a visually enveloping scene and a hard-to-make-out scene.

Take a look at this shot from Tim Burton’s Batman for example: 

Burtonesque - The World of Tim Burton's Batman

To me, this shot says “this setting is alive.” It’s active — traffic signs emit red and green neon, lampshades illuminate rain-soaked streets, and Gotham citizens populate all the space in between. Now think about if this scene were lit differently — or if it were lit less. Would it feel kinetic? Or would it simply be dark and dreary? I think the answer is clear.

The World of Tim Burton’s Big Fish

What do you think of this shot? I think the bright lights communicate a dreamlike-feel and serve as a bridge between Burton’s naturalistic and theatrical perspectives. This is a set that’s grounded in reality but elevated by exaggerated lighting. All in all, it’s singularly Burton.

If you’re interested in exploring other lighting styles, check out our list on the best video lighting kits for filmmakers .

Tim Burton Style Analysis of Music

Burton and elfman — a musical pair.

Tim Burton and composer Danny Elfman have worked together on 16 films and counting. Their 30-year working career is one of the most prolific in modern cinema. Let’s take a look at the trailer for their documentary interview together and then we’ll explore how Elfman has helped to style Tim Burton and his movies with an equally specific aesthetic.

A Conversation With Danny Elfman & Tim Burton Trailer

Danny Elfman’s scores play a huge part in the success of nearly all of Tim Burton’s feature films — from the bizarro synth-sounds of Beetlejuice to the orchestral horns of Batman .

And the great thing about Elfman is that his scores are always exaggerated, and singularly unique that fits like a glove inside the Tim Burton style.

Their working relationship has proven to be a perfect match. You’ll find Elfman’s scores on many lists of the best movie scores of all time .

Tim Burton Style Analysis of Character Design

Tim burton characters are unique.

We know Tim Burton characters are unique — and not just for their own sake, they’re an essential aspect of the Tim Burton aesthetic. His characters are defined by their exaggerated features; long frizzled hair, baggy eyes, gangly limbs, etc. But the over-the-top features of these characters often serve the role of a smokescreen, hiding their innate human side.

We imported some of the best Tim Burton character designs into StudioBinder’s storyboarding software — you won’t want to miss our take on these iconic characters. Click below to download the entire collection.

Tim Burton Characters  •   Click to view the shot list

Tim burton german expressionism roots, tim burton costumes have purpose.

We also know that Tim Burton costumes are almost always showstoppers. Perhaps we should give credit to costume designer Colleen Atwood who’s worked on 12 films with Burton too. Their working relationship has produced some of the best costumes in recent cinema history, such as the costumes of Edward Scissorhands and Sweeney Todd. 

Let’s go behind the scenes of Alice in Wonderland to see Johnny Depp get into character as the Mad Hatter — “Tim Burton style."

Tim Burton Costumes Johnny Depp in Alice in Wonderland

It’s amazing to hear that there’s a historical explanation for the Mad Hatter’s well… madness. Depp says that old hatters used to use glue with mercury to keep the hats together, which sometimes caused the wearer to go mad. This is just one example of a Tim Burton costume design serving more than just an aesthetic purpose.

Tim Burton Style Analysis of Drawing

Inside the tim burton drawing style.

The “Tim Burton drawing style” is instantly recognizable. Here’s an exercise: take out a piece of paper and a pencil, close your eyes, think of a character Tim Burton would conceptualize and begin to draw it.

What does it look like? Big eyes? Crazy hair? Ghoulish features? Maybe it looks something like Burton’s concept art for Edward Scissorhands .

Tim Burton Drawing Style of Edward Scissorhands

We see this approach to detail everywhere in Burton’s works, from Frankenweenie to The Nightmare Before Christmas (which was directed by Henry Selick). Likewise, we even see some Tim Burton animation styles translate over to his live-action films, like they do here in Big Eyes .

Tim Burton Animation Blends With Live Action in Big Eyes

If you want to create a drawing style as audaciously bold and instantly recognizable as Burton has, don’t do what he’s done, do the opposite; do something in between; do what you want to see. It’s not a bad idea to imitate Burton as a practice in design, but in the end it’s essential that you create your own aesthetic. 

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Best Tim Burton Movies, Ranked

Now that we’ve run through a complete Tim Burton style analysis, you might be thinking “what are the best Tim Burton movies?” If that’s the case, check out our article where we rank every movie of Tim Burton’s legendary career. Can you guess which film took the top honor?

Up Next: Burton’s Films Ranked →

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Home — Essay Samples — Entertainment — Tim Burton — What Is Tim Burton Writing Style

What is Tim Burton Writing Style

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Tim Burton's 2005 stop-motion animated film "Corpse Bride" is a dark and enchanting tale that captivates audiences with its stunning visuals and hauntingly beautiful storyline. The film follows the story of Victor, a young man [...]

Edward Scissorhands, directed by Tim Burton, is a film that is rich with symbolism. The film follows the story of Edward, a man with scissors for hands, who is taken in by a suburban family. Throughout the movie, there are [...]

Only so many things have the privilege of being consider masterpieces, but Tim Burton’s filmography including Beetlejuice (1988), A Nightmare Before Christmas (1993), and Batman (1989) are a collection of masterpieces. 1990’s [...]

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Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange is a novel pervaded by a multifaceted and intrinsic musical presence. Protagonist Alex’s fondness for classical music imbues his character with interesting dimensions, and resonates well [...]

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'Burtonesque': Breaking Down the Gothic Cinematic Style of Tim Burton

How do you describe the work of tim burton easy—you describe them as "burtonesque"..

If you watch films like  Beetlejuice ,  Edward Scissorhands , or  Corpse Bride , it's quite clear that they were all directed by the same comically macabre individual, Tim Burton. Experiencing his brand of cinema is a lot like walking into an abandoned amusement park, or a haunted carnival, or a nightmarish circus—it's entertaining—and even endearing at times, but it's also extremely dark and deeply disturbing. His style is so unique that he has joined the ranks of filmmakers whose names have made the transition from moniker to adjective, like Stanley Kubrick, David Lynch , and Alfred Hitchcock. In this video essay, Fandor's Philip Brubaker defines exactly what "Burtonesque" is, from the concept of the "heroic loner" to his surrealistic humor.

Burton's body of work has gone through several changes throughout his career, but the "esque" of his style really comes from his earlier work from the late 80s to the mid-late 90s. Films like  Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands,  and his two contributions to the  Batman  franchise contain a number of his narrative tropes, as well as his iconic gothic/idyllic imagery.

In terms of the narrative, Burton's films, at least from this time, tend to feature a protagonist that Brubaker calls the "heroic loner", which is quite a departure from the traditional underdog hero that was (and still is) popular in films in that Burton's heroes aren't lowly nerds that desire companionship or acceptance from others in their community. His heroes are lowly nerds/goths/super crime fighters that are 100% happy with their lonely existence secluded from others. In Brubaker's own words:

Burton’s heroic characters are troubled loners, isolated from the rest of the world. But some of them like it that way. Batman is a recluse, as is Edward Scissorhands. Pee-wee Herman is a happy loner.

In terms of cinematic style, Burton's films are—interesting. They're dark, demented, and nightmarish, but they also have a strange innocence and element of childlike wonder, too. He creates a dichotomy between the gothic and idyllic—the dark and the light—but since it's Burton, the darks and lights are warped by the funhouse mirror of his creativity. In  Beetlejuice , the dichotomy is between down home (and recently deceased) couple Adam and Barbara and the pretentious big city Deetz family. In  Edward Scissorhands , it's between artificial leather-clad man with scissors for hands Edward and a (seemingly) artificial bubblegum pop suburban town. 

As time went on, though, Burton's style changed—it became less edgy, less dark, less gothic. Even when he did  make a return to form, like with Dark Shadows  and  Alice in Wonderland , it almost felt like Tim Burton was trying to make a "Tim Burton film", but wasn't quite getting it right. However, films like  Big Eyes , Big Fish , and the newly released  Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children , which are much more commercial and deviate greatly from his early work, do contain bits and pieces of that "Burtonesque" style that made his films so iconic.

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Should You Use A Dutch Angle Shot?

Camera angles can communicate a lot of different emotions to your audience, but none so much as the dutch angle..

The Dutch angle can be used to make an audience feel a host of different emotions, like fear, uneasiness, even drunkenness. It can help heighten psychological distress and tension, creating a cinematic environment that makes for a thrilling, suspenseful experience. As creative and effective as this technique may be, its use doesn't always produce the desired effect overall (for reasons we'll get to later).

Here is our extensive coverage on how to use the dutch angle .

Jacob T. Swinney explores the subtle and overt use of this shot in an assortment of films in the video below:

Also known as the Dutch tilt, canted, German, and oblique angle, this shot was first used in Robert Wiese's 1920 horror film The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari . However, throughout the course of cinematic history this camera technique has gone through seasons of being considered in vogue and passé.

Whether or not you know which season this angle currently in, you can still use it as long as you know the major tenet of using -- just about anything and everything, including this angle, in your film. It must serve your story. Throwing it in arbitrarily just won't cut it; it must be motivated. For example, if you've got a scene in which a man and woman are chatting about scones, you might want to go more conventional. However, if they're chatting about scones and the woman has a gun in her pocket with orders to assassinate the man, that would be an excellent time to get weirder.

Besides, they don't have to be extreme; they can be subtle. However, if you do want them to be extreme, they can be -- but again, they have to be motivated. One of my favorite uses of this tilt comes from Roger Deakins' work in Doubt. He masterfully uses the dutch tilts to, you guessed it, cast doubt on the nature of Father Flynn's relationship with a young boy in the parish school. He doesn't use them throughout the entire movie, though; they appear in only a few shots, but those few shots are just enough to convey the important message that no one can be certain whether or not Sister Aloysius is correct in her suspicions.

This is the takeaway. A Dutch angle is like salt: you can use it boldly for flavor, but too much might leave a bad taste in people's mouths.

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Tim Burton has built his career around an iconic visual aesthetic. Here’s how it evolved.

Every Tim Burton movie is channeling specific visual influences — plus his own alienated childhood.

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Tim Burton is one of modern filmmaking’s best-known directors — largely because his films all look like Tim Burton films. It’s hard to find a recent director whose distinct visual aesthetic has become so universally, immediately recognizable. Even in his new live-action Disney film Dumbo , which is something of a departure from Burton’s previous work — it’s a remake that doubles as a careful critique of its predecessor — it can still easily be called “ Burton-esque ,” like all of his movies.

But what does it mean to be “Burton-esque?” Is there a way to catalog the visual ingredients of a Burton film? And how did Burton develop such a distinct visual style that continues to resonate so strongly with audiences?

The answers to these queries are more concrete than you might expect. Burton got his start in the industry working as an animator for Walt Disney Studios, where he began to develop his staple brand of quirkiness. Before that, he grew up absorbing a range of pop art styles and cinematic influences that later led to his becoming something of an alienated gothic hero — which still makes itself felt in his work today.

Burton grew up identifying with moody iconoclasts — and developing an art style to match

Where it all began. Tim Burton in his Halloween costume made by his mother. pic.twitter.com/7Mx6L4OIFJ — Nicky Locklear (@nickytryhard) March 12, 2018

Born in 1958 in Burbank, California, Burton grew up with an inverse relationship to his surroundings. Where Burbank was sunny and benign, Burton was moody, interested in the dark and the macabre. When other kids played ball and rode bicycles, he hung out in cemeteries and wax museums. He developed a love for Hammer horror films and B-movie sci-fi. He seemed to channel these sensibilities into his art, displaying a penchant for exaggerated caricatures and illustrations influenced by a range of pop art from advertising to children’s illustrators to comics.

By age 15, he was winning local advertising art contests , shooting creepy 8mm films around his neighborhood, and creating an illustrated children’s book of his own — which Disney, incidentally, rejected for publication, albeit with an encouraging note. Disney told Burton that “the art is very good. The characters are charming and imaginative, and have sufficient variety to sustain interest.” It would be the start of a long and sometimes contentious relationship with the Mouse.

After high school, Burton attended the prestigious California Institute of the Arts, which opened in 1961, partly out of the last great vision of Walt Disney himself. Disney died in 1966, but his brother and nephew were both on the school’s founding board of trustees. Disney had imagined an arts school designed specifically to educate new generations of animators, but it wasn’t until 1975 that the school began admitting students into a program to teach character animation.

A year later, in 1976, Burton joined the new animator program, becoming one of a now-legendary era of CalArts animators who would collectively go on to profoundly impact the next four decades of animation. These included famed Disney animator Glen Keane, The Nightmare Before Christmas director Henry Selick, Brave director Brenda Chapman, and Lion King director Rob Minkoff. He described them to Vanity Fair in 2014 as “ a collection of outcasts ,” a group of artists who were united by general nerdiness and a shared excitement about taking artistic risks and experimenting. (Incidentally, another figure who’d play a significant role in Burton’s career, Paul Reubens a.k.a Pee-wee Herman, was also on the campus studying theater at the same time.)

The Vanity Fair CalArts profile reports a steady blur of wild parties, dark senses of humor, and perpetual impromptu performance art — all of which Burton essentially blended into his personal brand. “One year [for Halloween] I did a bunch of makeup, and when I woke up, my face was stuck to the floor,” he recalled. “So it was sickening, really, but it’s one of my few fond memories.” This seems to be a representative picture of the era at CalArts’ character animation department, and of Burton himself.

Burton’s early career at Disney was difficult — but it set the tone for everything after

At CalArts, Burton animated several short films and developed his signature style as an illustrator of characters with amusingly exaggerated features. One of his student works, a partly silent animated short called Stalk of the Celery Monster , once again earned him attention from Walt Disney Studios, which brought him on as an animation apprentice after his graduation from CalArts in 1980, drawing mainly concept art and models for features.

At CalArts, Burton’s general air of weirdness was essentially encouraged by the prevailing spirit of the era. But at Disney, where he worked for four years, Burton’s iconoclastic style frequently made him an outlier, and he was largely relegated to producing concept art for films like 1981’s The Fox and the Hound and 1983’s The Black Cauldron . The work went unused . “I couldn’t even fake the Disney [art] style,” he wrote later in the book Burton on Burton .

Speaking about that era of Disney to Vanity Fair, Brad Bird (director of The Incredibles ) described it as a generational clash. “As Disney’s top-tier guys retired, the people running things became the businesspeople and the middle-level animation artists who had been there awhile,” Bird said. “They just wanted to sit back and coast on the Disney reputation while we younger guys were on fire, full of the ideas that the old-master Disney guys inspired in us. Now we were the ones thinking outside the box.” In the same article, Glen Keane recalled Burton hiding in a coat closet for hours.

But Burton didn’t just mope around. While at Disney, he solidified his own unique art style, with its weirdly elongated shapes and people, and a touch of the maudlin, the gothic, and the slightly off-kilter. He developed the concepts for a number of films that Disney initially rejected — including The Nightmare Before Christmas . He did, however, manage to produce a few works for Disney that showcased what would later become hallmarks of his instantly recognizable art style. The most notable is probably a short film called Vincent — based on Burton’s own childhood, including his idealization of the actor Vincent Price, known for his appearances in horror films.

Vincent (1982) combines Burton’s burgeoning visual aesthetic with his lifelong love of the macabre and interest in stop-motion animation. Narrated by Price himself, the film displays much of Burton’s trademark weirdness — like misunderstood goth kids in suburbia, and an obsession with dark subjects that manifests in unconventional ways. It’s also atypically dark for an animated Disney film of the era and was never individually released. (It later showed up as a package with some versions of The Nightmare Before Christmas .)

Following Vincent , Burton’s independent artistic forays met with less success. Disney produced his next short film, Frankenweenie , about a boy who tries to bring his small dog back from the dead, in 1984 — but then immediately fired him .

“When he made the film in 1984, I don’t think Disney knew what to do with him,” said producer Don Hahn, who’d worked with Burton back in his Disney days, in a 2012 interview with Yahoo UK. “It’s like, ah, here’s this really interesting guy who’s making these really rangy black-and-white movies. Let’s let him go.” Burton revived Frankenweenie as a feature-length film in 2012, which Hanh produced.

Of course, in all fairness to Disney, it could also be because this was Burton’s idea of a fun day at the office:

celebrating the release of dumbo by remembering when tim burton got his wisdom teeth taken out while working as a disney animator & then spent the rest of the day wandering around the lot showing off his teeth & bleeding all over the place pic.twitter.com/VZuVwoD8be — Nick Usen (@nickusen) March 27, 2019

After leaving, Burton quickly caught an amazing break: His old classmate Paul Reubens, now better known as his alter ego Pee-Wee Herman, had seen Vincent and asked Burton to direct a big-screen adaptation of his character. Burton, who had directed one live-action piece while at Disney, 1983’s Hansel and Gretel , was game for any project that would let him continue to express his particular style, and agreed. 1985’s Pee-wee’s Big Adventure grossed $40 million on a budget of less than $7 million, and launched Burton’s prolific career as a film director.

He would go on to bring the world a litany of iconic films for the next several decades, most notably Beetlejuice (1988); Batman (1989) and Batman Returns (1992); Edward Scissorhands (1990); The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) — which he produced and created but left to his fellow CalArts alum Henry Selick to direct; Mars Attacks! (1996); Sleepy Hollow (1999); Big Fish (2003); Corpse Bride (2005); Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007); and Alice in Wonderland (2010). And though most of these films are live action, they all continue to develop and expand the artistic style he expressed early on.

By the time Disney released Burton’s full-length feature version of Frankenweenie in 2012, Burton’s name had become an undeniable brand of its own. And that brand was still closely associated with Disney, which had by then happily embraced him as a producer and director on several of its films. Describing his on-again, off-again relationship with Disney to the Independent upon Frankenweenie ’s 2012 release, Burton simply said , “I’ve been hired and fired by Disney three different times. I’m used to it.”

But far from being defined by his rocky relationship with Disney, Burton is regarded as a singular visionary, defined entirely by his unique style. To properly define the Burton style, we can point to a couple of specific important visual and artistic influences that made his art and his overall production style what it is today.

Burton’s art and cinema are hugely influenced by Expressionism

Burton’s own aesthetic reflects German Expressionism more than any other style. Expressionism began as a modern art movement and quickly expanded to influence art across Europe in the 1920s. Drawing upon what was then the still-new field of psychotherapy, Expressionist film became a cinematic medium in which the overall scenic and production design produced a feeling of dreamlike unreality and psychological tension for the viewer.

The traits of Expressionism have become incorporated so successfully into certain modes of storytelling within art, cinema, and animation that the casual viewer might not realize these features all have a distinct origin point . Among the most distinctive features are sharply exaggerated backdrops and landscapes with high color contrasts — typically relying heavily on the use of shadows and silhouettes to heighten a feeling of tension or dread. Sets with jagged edges and alternately rounded, tilted, or visually disjointed and discombobulated spaces, are another key element.

A general sense of visual distortion, the use of dialed-up color contrasts, looming architectural shapes, and an overall sense of heightened reality, are all further key parts of the aesthetic that form basic components of a “Burtonesque” look. Expressionism has influenced so many subsequent art and film styles — everything from film noir to Surrealist art, from art deco architecture to midcentury horror — that its impact on Burton’s own style hardly makes him unique. However, from here on out, his influences may seem even more surreal.

The Day of the Dead made a huge impression on Burton

In Latin America, the annual celebration of the Day of the Dead is traditionally accompanied by a host of colorful depictions of skulls and skeletons . Among these are reanimated skulls and skeletons known as calaveras, and calacas, skulls and skull masks worn during ceremonies. Burton’s work is full of references to calacas and calaveras.

You’re probably thinking of Jack Skellington in Nightmare Before Christmas as the most obvious example of this influence, but Emily, the titular bride of Corpse Bride , is also a walking calavera. Both films wear their love for Dios de Los Muertes on their bony sleeves.

But perhaps no style is more overt in the work of and more closely associated with Tim Burton than that of the gothic.

Tim Burton films are obviously gothic — but with a twist

The concept of the “gothic” originated first as a pejorative, derived from the Goths and Visigoths who sacked Ancient Rome , to refer to a distinct style of medieval architecture as barbarous and uncivilized . It was meant as an insult, yet it grew to be associated with unsettling, disconcerting feelings of awe and dread that could be evoked by such elaborately beautiful architecture and art. And so when Horace Walpole published his scandalous novel, The Castle of Otranto , in 1764, he called it “a gothic story” because it was set in a massive, haunted castle whose dark hallways and unknown mysteries were meant to horrify .

Walpole essentially expanded the tone of gothic architecture and gothic art into what we now know as gothic literature — a genre full of distinctive, familiar horror tropes: huge dark buildings looming up out of the mist; tortured heroes and antiheroes meeting their doom over a tragic lost love or an unearthed secret from their past; and a sense of delight in the sinister, the grotesque, the weird, the bloody, and the terrifying.

Between his love for Vincent Price, Edgar Allan Poe, skeletons, and cemeteries, Burton soaked up plenty of gothic inspiration as a child. But remember — he also grew up in peaceful, quintessentially suburban Burbank, where he was constantly fascinated with thoughts of ominous and dark things lurking beneath the surface.

As a mature artist, Tim Burton’s work married his love of the surreal to stories that stripped away the banality of everyday, politely civilized life. Vincent and Frankenweenie are about normal boys feeding their love for the grotesque within quiet normal households. The Nightmare Before Christmas is about the unholy juxtaposition of Halloween and Christmas. Sweeney Todd sees a serial killer opening up a respectable barber shop; though based on an existing musical, its themes fit perfectly into the Burton portfolio. And in Edward Scissorhands , Edward’s nightmare house is next to, well, this:

This juxtaposition is probably best exemplified in Burton’s Beetlejuice , which is an entire movie about the sinister surprise that may be lurking in your otherwise idyllic suburban neighborhood.

Burton’s distorted, slightly dystopian suburbia often takes on a gleefully manic, almost circus-like form that’s descended from gothic’s bloodier cousin, Grand Guignol . We see its influence in films like Beetlejuice , Charlie and the Chocolate Factory , and Sweeney Todd . Whether or not things get bloody, they’re always tinged with an awareness that things could get bloody. And that’s the heart of the gothic in a Burton work.

Burton also cites a number of mid-century sci-fi and horror films as influences over his work

In 2009, the Museum of Modern Art produced a wildly successful exhibition of Tim Burton’s art and sculpture, showcasing material from throughout his life and career as an artist and filmmaker. In conjunction with the exhibit, Burton curated a list of films that had had key influences over his life’s work. The film series, called “Tim Burton and the Lurid Beauty of Monsters,” included a wide-ranging list, from the works of B-movie scion Roger Corman to horror films by James Whale, Tobe Hooper, and many others.

From this list, you get a clear sense of the zany, colorful, slightly surreal and over-the-top influences that resonated with Burton as a kid. It’s not easy to locate the full list of films online, so we’re presenting it here for your further Burton study and edification.

• The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949)
• The Omega Man (1971)
• Jason and the Argonauts (1963)
• Mad Monster Party (1967)
• Frankenstein (1931)
• The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)
• Murders in the Rue Morgue (1932)
• Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959)
• Dracula (1931)
• The Raven (1935)
• Bride of the Monster (1955)
• Pit and the Pendulum (1961)
• The Mummy’s Hand (1940)
• The Creature From the Back Lagoon (1954)
• The Mummy’s Tomb (1942)
• When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth (1970)
• Revenge of the Creature (1955)
• The Towering Inferno (1974)
• Nosferatu (1922)
• The Swarm (1978)
• Earthquake (1974)
• The Brain from Planet Arous (1957)
• Scream Blacula Scream (1973)
• The Brain that Wouldn’t Die (1962)
• Tex Avery Cartoons: Swing Shift Cinderella (1945); Red Hot Riding Hood (1943); Little Rural Riding Hood (1949); The Cat that Hated People (1948)

The Burton-esque style is derived from a wealth of art, cinematic, and literary genres. But if Burton’s work was just copied from his influences, it wouldn’t resonate with viewers. What Burton brings to all these ideas is his own joyous idiosyncrasy — his ability to meld the ominous and the frightful with a sense of whimsy, and then turn that unholy duet into part of the act and the art of being a tortured outsider.

These traits make his films feel personal and relatable to so many of us, whether we come from the same superficially sunny suburbia or not. Burton may have spent his childhood in a world that didn’t suit him, but he’s channeled that into a visual style that unites him with us all.

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Analysis Of Tim Burton's Style Of Filmmaking

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Home Essay Examples Entertainment Tim Burton

Tim Burton's Style Of Cinematography

• Category Entertainment
• Subcategory Movies
• Topic Tim Burton

Undoubtedly, Tim Burton showcases one of the most unique styles of cinematography and film directorship to date. Through displaying his own idiosyncratic styles, themes, motifs, syntax, imagery and perception of modern societies through well-known films, such as Edward Scissorhands (1990) and Vincent (1982), Tim Burton has managed to successfully differentiate himself from other globally recognised directors. Tim Burton demonstrates his distinctive cinematic styles by incorporating originative stylistic techniques, to allude to the audience a wide array of underlying motifs and messages. Many of the underlying messages that can be identified throughout his films relate back to his childhood, where he had been heavily influenced by classic horror films, such as Frankenstein (1931). Such influences had effectively shaped his personality into an eccentric young man who adores all things macabre, later utilising his own personality to develop his unique auteur-ship. Such cinematic themes and styles that are displayed throughout his work include the incorporation of German Expressionism, the utilisation of cinematic features such as lighting and a common repeated focus on eccentric, outcasted characters. Tim Burton utilises and accentuates these cinematic features to further demonstrate his own personal perception of the modern world with the societal standards and expectations that come along with it.

By definition, German Expressionism was an early 20th Century art movement, stemming from Germany. It heavily emphasised the creator or artist’s individual feelings, revolving around the concept of society and reality. This particular art movement and style is profoundly characterised through the use of dark and stylised sets, the heavy distortion of space and reality, over-exaggerated acting and often the use of Chiaroscuro lighting. Throughout his career, Tim Burton has become renowned in Contemporary Cinema for utilising and implementing themes featured in German Expressionism, with a few of his most popular films, such as Edward Scissorhands, containing prominent characters that exude conspicuous similarities to that of German Expressionist Cinema. Edward Scissorhands captures a glimpse of a modern-day take on German Expressionism, featuring a main protagonist, Edward, adorned in exaggerated Gothic makeup and stark black clothing. This subsequently creates the idea that he is exceedingly different from the society around him, setting him up to become the ‘outcast’ character. In the film, the whole town in which the plot is set, is presented as a bright pastel utopia, featuring symmetrical roads and sizeable shapes, almost appearing cartoon-like. In cinematography, expressionistic films commonly incorporate large shapes of bright colours, which ensues the juxtaposition of similar shapes. In the utopian town, Edward’s castle stands in contrast with the others, as his castle has a dark cartoon-like outline as shown in the film, with crooked tree lines forming a visually uncomfortable silhouette. Situated atop a hill on the outskirt of the town, Edward’s castle shows an observable resemblance to a scene shown in The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), a renowned cinematic film showcasing German Expressionism, which also displays a visually uncomfortable town with a mountain-like layout. Throughout many of his films, Tim Burton successfully encapsulates features of German Expressionism. Whether it be dark, sombre sets with sharp, angular and irregular shapes through buildings with varying heights, pointed roofs, disproportionate windows, angled stairs, Tim Burton consistently manages to disrupt the cinematic equilibrium as German Expressionism is most famous for, whilst successfully capturing and exposing the chaotic imbalance of society.

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Through his films, Tim Burton ingeniously incorporates efficacious cinematic techniques, such as a wide variety of camera angles, lighting and colour, to communicate a touching and poignant underlying message to the audience which may not be obvious at first. The use of dramatic lighting, creating evident juxtaposition through colour contrasts, has become globally renowned as being ‘Burton-esque’, ultimately trademarking this cinematic technique as his own. As displayed in the film Vincent, through the use of light, he effectively opposes light or high-key scenes for Vincent’s normal, mundane childhood with dark or low-key scenes for his imagined and grotesque desires, such as the desire to dip his aunt in wax for his wax museum.

An example of this can be found through the entirety of the short film, where it is entirely shot in black and white. The film uses a wide variety of camera angles, such as low shots and wide shots, to accentuate the world that Vincent is living in. During the film, we see that Vincent is posed as extremely small and feeble compared to his mother. By placing the adult figures at a higher standpoint than Vincent himself, it effectively communicates Tim Burton’s own personal standpoint on the displacement and disfiguration of power between adults and children in today’s modern society. Another substantially apparent effect of lighting is the mood it synthesizes and creates. During the scenes in which the figures and characters are depicted as pale or low-key, the audience is made to feel uncomfortable, as characters, especially humans, are not normally depicted to be such a sombre shade. The same cinematic technique is utilized and displayed in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005). In the inception of the film, darker and paler shades of colours are emphasized in the surrounding scenery of the town, especially inside and around Charlie’s home. However, once the characters step inside the chocolate factory, conspicuous and vibrant colours are introduced. It becomes apparent that his style is highly influenced by his lighting effects which in turn affects the tone, mood, and imagery of the film. This then aids him in creating his own globally recognisable cinematic style, differentiating him from other auteurs and directors.

In many of Tim Burton’s works, an eccentric outcast character is almost always present. By integrating the use of this type of character, he successfully manages to relate the film to his own personal experiences growing up as a child in one way or another. As Tim Burton grew up identifying himself with moody iconoclasts, he experienced a widely inverse relationship with his own surroundings. Opposed to the sunny Burbank in which he grew up in, he developed an interest in all things dark and macabre, eventually influencing him to incorporate characters that he felt he could connect within his work. Edward Scissorhands is a great example. He comes off as mysterious to others and finds himself alienated and alone due to his “unfinished” condition. This contributes to his own personal sense of unbelonging and alienation from the rest of the society around him. The same can be said with Vincent, where he is constantly pressured to fit into a normality constructed by his mother. Secretly, Vincent sees himself as an outcast amongst all of his friends, which becomes apparent through the line “While other kids read books like Go Jane Go, Vincent’s favourite author is Edgar Allen Poe.”. Throughout each film, both characters noticeably struggle to fit into the societal normalities placed upon them, whether it be through physical appearance or mental behaviour. This theme, however, is abundant throughout many Tim Burton films, making his movies easily identifiable to the audience as they all contain a similar and common character trope.

In conclusion, Tim Burton is an established auteur that is set apart from other directors in the same industry, due to the fact that he has successfully managed to create his own style of cinematography. He has skilfully incorporated the use of 1920’s German Expressionism, creating a unique and eye-catching piece that is easily identifiable as his own. By utilising a wide variety of cinematic techniques such as light manipulation and colour schemes, it helps establish his own unique framework of production style, using consistent repetition throughout all of his films. However, the most differentiating factor that sets Tim Burton apart from other directors, is the fact that throughout every film, he relates it back to his own personal life and his upbringing through the incorporation of an outcast character. In today’s world of cinematography, it is rare to find such a skilled and renowned auteur that relates their story back to their own personal life, and through doing that, it establishes a deeper and more personal connection between the audience and Tim Burton himself.

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Tim Burton Cinematic Style Analysis Essay

Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu once said, “Cinema is universal, beyond flags and borders and passports. ” By that, he meant that films uphold the concept of “show, not tell,” using various cinematic techniques and strategies to create a mood and tone that anyone in audience, despite language barrier, can understand. Tim Burton is an American director, producer and screenwriter who has directed and produced over a dozen major films, each one upholding to a distinct style that Burton has created.

Burton was inspired by Vincent Price when he was younger, and strives to imitate his dark style in many of the movies he has created throughout his career. He does so by combining multiple cinematic techniques to create darker undertones. Through these techniques, his mood often becomes suspenseful and sometimes even terrifying. The movies Edward Scissorhands, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and Big fish all demonstrate how Burton’s use of music, lighting, and framing contribute to the feelings of tension and horror in his films. Burton’s manipulation of lighting emphasizes the fearful and suspenseful mood.

For instance, in the boat scene in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, the director uses flashing lights in harsh colors to mimic the panic the characters are feeling as they travel through the swirling rapids of Wonka’s factory. The use of the color red creates a feeling of panic, as red is usually associated with something dangerous, making the viewer worry on the characters’ behalves, understanding that the situation they are in is dangerous. This creates an atmosphere of fear, as the viewer can emphasize with the way the characters are feeling.

Similarly, in Edward Scissorhands, Burton uses low level, backlit lighting during the scene where Edward is rising out of the shadows to create a fearful mood. Peg, watching the dark figure rise up, is scared because he looks dangerous, with scissors for hands and tall lanky figure. As a result, the mood becomes scary. The lighting adds to this feeling, as the back light creates dark shadows, which are often associated with gloom and fear. Lastly, Burton also uses dark lighting in his film Big Fish to establish a fearful mood, such as in the scene in the forest.

The forest is initially introduced as being dangerous and ominous, as everyone who goes in never returns. When Edward Bloom goes inside, the dark lighting makes the forest seem even more mysterious and since the viewer knows that it is likely perilous, the dark lighting adds to the feeling of fear and suspense, as the viewer doesn’t know what could happen to Edward. Tim Burton uses strategically placed lights to create feelings of fear and tension and to intensify the mood within the story to serve the plot.

The music used in Burton films is carefully selected to compliment the scene and create suspense and fear, contributing the distinct style that Burton is so well known for. In Edward Scissorhands, when Peg walks into the house, the director juxtaposes music to create suspense. When Peg is in the garden, the music is light and pretty, making the mood light and happy. However, as soon as she enters the house, the music grows dark and heavy, with low undertones. This dramatic shift creates suspense, as because the shift is so sudden, the viewer knows that something inside the house is dangerous or evil.

Likewise, in Charlie and the Chocolate factory, when Charlie is unwrapping the candy bar, the music rises with a crescendo to create suspense. The music increases in loudness and speed, as well as general intensity during the scene. This, accompanied with the slow zoom in on Charlie’s face, creates suspense, because the viewer is impatient to see if Charlie got the ticket. By drawing out the scene and making the music sound urgent, Burton creates suspense, as what is happening on screen is significant and the viewer wants to know the result.

Finally, sometimes, the lack of sound is what creates suspense, like in the scene in Edward Scissorhands where Peg meets Edward in the house. When she enters the attic, the dramatic music that was playing just moments before abruptly ceases, and there is almost no sound. The lack of sound is unsettling, as, in a normal situation, sound is usually present. The sudden shift from loud music to complete silence indicates a build up. This creates suspense by making the viewer believe that something significant is about to occur.

Without the music, the room seems empty and creepy, and the audience feels as though something could jump out suddenly, putting them on edge. Burton’s use of music is one of the most iconic things about his films, as the music is often carefully crafted and used to emphasize the mood, usually with elements of fear and suspense. Tim Burton utilizes different shots and angles to create fear and suspense at various points in his films. For instance, in the movie Big Fish, Burton uses a low shot to depict the witch’s house, who is introduced as being an antagonist, which creates suspense and an atmosphere of fear.

The low angle makes the house look grander, making the audience see the characters as more vulnerable. This causes the viewer to feel scared for them, as the danger is imminent but the characters seems to be defenseless. Likewise, in Edward Scissorhands, in the scene where Peg goes up to the attic, the shot is very zoomed out, making her seem weak and helpless, creating a fearful mood. The viewer’s concern for her adds to the feeling of fear, because the viewer has gotten attached to the character and does not want anything bad to happen.

Furthermore, a number of other techniques indicate that the situation is in fact dangerous, creating tension and dramatic irony. This dramatic irony, in which the viewer knows that the character is facing danger but the character is unaware and defenseless, is mimicked by the shots, creating feelings of suspense and fear. In addition, in his film, Big Fish, Burton creates tension and evokes feelings of fear when the giant first exits his cave. The angle from which the scene is shot is very 1st person, intended to be from the perspective of the giant.

As a result, the angle is from above, making Edward Bloom seem small. This highlights that Bloom is at a disadvantage against the giant, who we know to be dangerous, creating suspense because we want to know how he will avoid the situation and fear because we worry for his safety. The angles and shots the director chooses to use are intentionally selected to create feelings of fear or tension, and to intensify what is happening on the screen by making the viewer concerned and eager to find out what is going to happen.

The use of music, lighting, and framing within Tim Burton’s films creates and develops a mood that is prevalent throughout many of his cinematic works- a mood of horror and suspense. These techniques, combined with his dark and bizarre story lines, produce the cinematic style Burton is so well known for. Through the study of various cinematic techniques, people are able to interpret movies on a deeper level, understanding that every single aspect of them was intentional and planned by the director.

Certain directors and screenwriters tend to stick to the same approaches and the same styles, which can be detected more easily with background knowledge on the different techniques and what effect they have on the mood and tone of the film. Burton is a perfect example of a director with habits, and through studying his films, we are able to understand how and why specific techniques were used, and thus, are able to fully appreciate the art of cinematography.

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Tim Burton’s Iconic Movies Style Evaluation Essay

Stylistic patterns are inherent components of any film. In most cases, filmmakers resort to identical patterns and salient techniques in several films organized around one element. In this regard, Tim Burton, a filmmaker who is famous for such films as Edward Scissorhands and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory , adheres to similar techniques to render the emotional atmosphere and original idea. In the film under consideration, Burton resorts to grotesque, alienation, and isolation when describing characters suffering from isolation through shooting, acting, costumes, and setting. The filmmaker applies these techniques in order to contrast the viewers’ stylistic expectations because both films have strange settings and architecture to emphasize the fabulousness throughout the stories. In addition, such contrast representation of costumes and setting is aimed at highlighting the heroes’ alienation and isolation from society. Finally, Burton also makes use of music being a powerful technique in emphasizing the overall mystical and fabulous atmosphere of the films.

In both films, Tim Burton provides an unusual, even mystical, presentation of the setting. Hence, in The Charlie and the Chocolate Factory , a huge accent is made on the architecture and setting, which is timeless and refers to different architectural styles. The village where Charlie reminds of the Middle Ages where the Chocolate factory refers to modern times being adherent to a fascist architecture. In the scene when Willi Wonka invites the children to his factory, everyone is terrified of the building because it differs greatly from their usual image of chocolate factories. Similarly, the film Edward Scissorhands provides a depiction of Edward’s house whose style reminds of Gothic architecture. Notably, the house contrasts greatly with other buildings in the town that can also be considered as a weird place where everything seems to be unreal or two ideal. Perhaps, this town can be associated with the concept of the American Dream that is also present in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory . Here Tim Burton makes use of design as a special technique to emphasize the mystery and fabulousness of the scenes. For example, the viewer can definitely perceive specific spirituality while watching the very first scene depicting perfectly cut lawns and beautiful flowerbeds. Locating a dark and creepy house in the background of this perfect world breaks the established balance in a perfect world where people are obsessed with a stereotypic way of thinking. In addition, the atmosphere of a fairy tale where scenes are filled with characters that seem to be real at a glance, but a closer look reveals that they are capable of doing surreal things. In this final scene, the viewers can observe how Edward can create ice sculptures. Therefore, when presented as a realistic film, the movie does not provide much for considerations, but when analyzed as a fairy tale, its ideas are clearly justified.

Another important technique used by the filmmaker is the character’s costumes which complement the overall idea about Burton’s skillful use of such stylistic devices as grotesque to highlight the moments of excess and to present viewers with a better image of the film’s fictional world where realistic pictures are distorted by perfect costumes and eccentric characters. Hence, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory makes use of mysterious and hilarious music that harmonizes with the melancholic tone of the film, although it still contains comic moments. Interestingly, although the film narrates dramatic and realistic events, the filmmaker decides a classical Hollywood format wherein music emphasizes the illusion of reality and debunks the slightest hints on realism. While referring to the first scene once again, we see a perfect lawn that looks unreal and Gothic-style house accompanied by creepy and mesmerizing music. On this background, this perfect landscape looks absurd and inappropriate. In the same way, viewers can notice that the events narrated in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory are accompanied by thrilling music which is more typical of fairy tales, although some moments and deeds are reminiscent of the real world. Considering the scene when the children saw the Chocolate factory for the first time we see the sincerity of Charlie’s amusement. The boy looks real but he finds himself in a fairy tale country.

In order to provoke the viewers’ attention, the author develops unconventional characters whose features and feelings rigidly contrast their appearance that does not fit well into the realistic picture of the films. The filmmaker makes viewers see a great gap between Wonka’s fictional, even illusionary world where everything is made up of sugar and chocolate and Charlie’s severely real world where people look quite realistic to drown in daily routine. Charlie’s character reminds the Hatter from Alice in Wonderland, because of his unusual make, straight and glitter hair, the awkward theatrical costume is distinguished as compared with Charlie’s appearance who looks like a mediocre boy. Using such technique, Burton attempts to show that Wonka is indeed lonely; he looks like a doll, a fictional character being delineated from the real world and his decision to invite children to his factory shows that he wants to be ordinary and find family and friends. The same can be seen in the Edward Scissorshand where Burton makes an accent on make and appearance to create invisible theatrical effect and to show that the depicted world is fictional. It should be stressed, however, that the film does not comprise fabulous landscapes and characters as compared with the second film under consideration. With the help of such devices, both films look quite pata-physical; the author as if wants to deceive the reality. Moreover, he creates a parody of the real world where Burton symbolically endows the object with properties.

In conclusion, the filmmaker resorts to stylistic techniques in both films under consideration to contrast viewers’ expectations. First of all, the scenes described above are pata-physical where the author endows fictional characters with real character traits. Second, both Edward Scissorhands and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory have grotesque settings and architecture that emphasize the fabulousness of the narrative structure. Third, by making an emphasis on costumes and appearance, Burton strives to emphasize the heroes’ isolation from society, which is also enhanced by mysterious music being a powerful technique. In general, the stylistic techniques used by the filmmaker have aimed at creating a necessary impression on viewers. Therefore, such effects as crane shots, setting, and strong narrative often reinforce and highlight various stylistic effects, such as grotesque, alienation, and spiritual transcendence. What is more important is that both movies skillfully combine those effects and techniques to render all narrative features of a fairy tale and provide a mysterious atmosphere.

Works Cited

Burton, Tim. dir. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Twentieth Century Fox, 2005. Film.

Burton, Tim. dir. Edward Scissorhands. Twentieth Century Fox, 1990. Film.

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Tim Burton And Style Of His Films

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