Projector: Title Screen Reading- "An exploration into Tim Burton's recurring use of alienated, outcast characters, and how it applies to Auteur Theory."
Speaker: Auteur Theory is wilted down to "three areas of competence – technique, personal style and inner meaning – and links these to directors as technician, stylist and auteur." (Item 7). In simpler terms: "Great artists, everyone agrees, listen to their own idiosyncratic muses. They don’t trim their art to please either elitist snobs or the ignorant masses."(Item 10).
"No one in Hollywood personifies his own movies as Tim Burton does." (Item 11). This quote is the basic outline of what I am trying to prove.
Tim Burton can definitely be argued to be seen as an auteur in many ways, but the one I'll be focusing on is the types of characters he always puts in his films; lonely, quirky, outcast members of society. This is seen in many films, Edward Scissorhands being a main example of it.
Projector: Edward Scissorhands "Avon Calling" Scene (6:30-12:56) (Item 1)
Speaker: The scene opens in a suburban area, and uses natural lighting and colours that are all bright, portraying that the area is welcoming and nice to live in. This is important, as it then highlights how lonely Edward is, and how much of an outcast he appears to be. Peg tilts her wing-mirror on her yellow car (another addition to the happy and welcoming vibe set earlier in the scene) and sees Edward's House; black, gothic, dilapidated, far away from everyone else, an exterior portrayal of what Edward looks like to the rest of society. We know that this was Burton's aim from the quote; "[Burton] has produced a body of work that focuses on the outcasts of society" (Item 13).
When Peg gets to Edward's house's courtyard, we see a juxtaposition through the background in the tracking shot (that follows Peg); the audience expects the area outside his house to look ruined whereas, in reality, it's actually beautifully well-groomed with hedge sculptures all around. The leaves are all a healthy green colour, showing that they are well looked after and are an initial sign of life. This is to make the audience aware that outside appearances aren't always a correct portrayal of the person inside. "There is an old saying that 'don’t judge a book by its cover' and Edward’s story is the perfect example of that." (Item 16).
Moving forward in the scene, we finally meet Edward; alone, in the dark, alienated and shut away from the rest of the world. The low key lighting in the scene portrays the fear of both Peg and Edward. The darkness also highlights Edward's loneliness, thus supporting my original point from the start: Tim Burton always uses lonely, outcasted types of characters in his work.
Focusing on the characterisation of Edward, I discovered that Burton possibly uses similar character types as he creates characters with an autobiographical portrayal as a goal. This is backed up by the quote: "A wild-haired eccentric arrives in town and demonstrates an extraordinary creativity – now where did movie wunderkind Tim Burton (wild-haired, deeply eccentric) get the idea for Edward Scissorhands?" (Item 12). There are many other quotes that support this idea, including another quote that discusses why Burton focuses on the alienated characteristics that he always uses. It states that "Burton's characters are often outsiders, misunderstood and perceived, misfits [...] And in many ways, he embodies the contradiction himself. [...] He may use Hollywood's money [to make his films]... but still makes them his way" (Item 8)
Projector: Edward Scissorhands "House Tour" Scene (16:00-17:08) (Item 1)
Speaker: In this scene, Edward is rigid, skittish and looking uncomfortable in the homely and warm-lit setting. In an interview with Johnny Depp, he stated that Edward was "almost like a dog" (Item 4) in the way that he moves and interacts with others. There is a two-shot in the scene of Edward and Peg, in which they are pretty close together; this shot shows that Edward is most comfortable around Peg as she accepted him, and welcomed him into her home. This is relevant to my research as Edward is used to being alienated and alone, so when he is accepted he finds it odd and he doesn't know how to act, thus showing the rigidness and timidness in his character. This again links to the idea that Tim Burton uses these alienated types of characters because they are true to him, almost autobiographical. This is backed up by the quote: "Burton's main characters are always linked to his own personality in some way" (Item 14). This means that Tim Burton has an emotional connection to every film he makes, as he has put part of himself into each of his films.
Projector: Edward Scissorhands "Confrontation" Scene (1:20:00- 1:22:30) (Item 1)
Speaker: In this scene, we are back at Edward's house, a setting that is a constant physical representation of Edward's emotions; this foreshadows what is going to happen in the scene. The darkness of it highlights his loneliness. The scene shows Edward protecting Kim, and consequently killing Kim's boyfriend Jim. This links to my original point, as it shows that even when Edward gets comfortable with being accepted, he ends up doing something bad and reverting back to being outcasted and lonely again. It suggests that Burton's characters never have a full sense of acceptance. This may also have an autobiographical sense, because all in all, audiences say it's "No surprise really, […] that the man behind the camera is Tim Burton" (Item 15).
Projector: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory "First Look of the Factory" Scene (28:70-39:00) (Item 2)
Speaker: "The factory itself, is like Wonka's brain; complicated, strange, fun, disturbing..." (Item 6). The quote perfectly represets and describes the type of character that I have discussed throughout my research project so far. We see this, particularly in this scene. Wonka's interactions can be seen as fairly odd; he is uncomfortable with human contact, he gets scared of the children and doesn't know what he can and can't say to people. He is a weird, outcasted person; we see his personality through his fashion sense, he wears purple gloves to show his discomfort in physical contact. Looking at the mise-en-scene, his hair is also cut in a fashion that wouldn't be considered normal or fashionable hairstyle at the time that the film came out. The background is very plain, with a huge black curtain across the back wall. The darkness of the background could represent Wonka's loneliness as in this scene, we always see Wonka in the middle of the close-up shots (he is also the only one in these shots) that we see him in, surrounded by the darkness. In the wider context of the film, we know that it is because Wonka grew up with an emotionally unavailable father, who was a dentist. This again suggests that Wonka is another one of Burton's autobiographical characters. This quote backs this idea up: "Q: Like many of your films, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and its main character has father issues. BURTON: Yeah, I've got some problems. You might have seen me enough to realize that by now. "(Item 5).
Projector: Sweeney Todd "No Place Like London" Scene (1:00-2:25) (Item 3)
Speaker: The whole scene is low-key lit, and the only light that's there is blue, making it seem cold. This suggests that Sweeney is cold-hearted and emotionally distant. The background is black, which could be a representation of his 'black heart' or the loneliness that he's surrounded by constantly. The colour black is also a connotation for death. "Sweeney's basically been dead since his life was taken away from all those years before..." (Item 9)
Projector: Blank Screen/Ending Slide
Speaker: To conclude, Tim Burton uses alienated, outcast characters consistently in all of his works. We particularly see this in his films Edward Scissorhands, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Sweeney Todd. This tells us that he is an auteur, as he has this specific directing signature in many of his films, and audiences always know when they are watching one of his films.
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