Alienation appears to be dominant theme in Tim Burton films, does this make him an auteur?
Annotated Catalogue
Films
Item 1 – Edward
Scissorhands (1990) I chose this as my main focus film to display Tim Burtons auteur presence as he deals with the theme of character isolation. Edward here has been alienated by his neighbours ( e.g. Esmeralda) who refer to him as a " pervert of nature". He is isolated from society due to his appearance; his hands are considered weird and abnormal. I also find this film very interesting to how Edwards appearance in the mise-en-scene is very similar to some of Tim Burtons characteristics himself and the reasoning behind this in his own life. This is critical in my research as this film displays the theme of isolation and alienation throughout the film using technical and audio codes.
Item 2 – Alice in
Wonderland (2010) A more recent Burton film shows his recurring theme of alienation/ isolation in numerous of characters; such as Alice and the mad hatter. The mad hatter is very similar to Edward Scissor hands due to the fact the physical appearance of both characters highlight they are an outcast in the societies they live in. This is a re-make of a classic Disney film and novel and shows a darker more meaningful take on the original, animated Disney film. Burtons quirky personality comes through in this film once again which is extremely useful to my research to use as evidence of the framework of Burtons auteur work.
Item 3 – Beetlejuice
(1988)
This film again focuses on isolation or alienation in the main character of Lydia - she is a goth, which is represented as an outcast and not being able to relate to her parents creates a dysfunction in the family. This once again refers to my focus film Edward Scissor hands as the physical representation is key, as both characters show a gothic lifestyle, through the use of mise-en-scene. However Lydia being an outsider makes her special and the fact is that everything that happens in Beetlejuice revolves around her from here on out, even if Barbara and Adam Maitland seem to be the more obvious protagonists. This film is useful and supports my two other significant films to help highlight the main theme of my research investigation and see recurring conventions through out the three films.
This film again focuses on isolation or alienation in the main character of Lydia - she is a goth, which is represented as an outcast and not being able to relate to her parents creates a dysfunction in the family. This once again refers to my focus film Edward Scissor hands as the physical representation is key, as both characters show a gothic lifestyle, through the use of mise-en-scene. However Lydia being an outsider makes her special and the fact is that everything that happens in Beetlejuice revolves around her from here on out, even if Barbara and Adam Maitland seem to be the more obvious protagonists. This film is useful and supports my two other significant films to help highlight the main theme of my research investigation and see recurring conventions through out the three films.
Magazines
Item 4 – From The Toronto Star, 10.02.1988, Sunday
' Guest star Catherine O'Hara on the set of Beetlejuice'
This magazine article was produced in 1988 the year Beetlejuice was released. This magazine article is an extract from Toronto star interviewing an actress from the film, Catherine O'Hara. She goes into detail how some audiences have viewed the film and their favourite scene from Beetlejuice. She also states why specific characters had the personality they did, this is useful for my research investigation as Catherine O'Hara states the significance of being insecure, which foreshadows the narrative theme throughout my chosen Tim Burton films, Alienation. As an interview the opinions can be taken as truthful and honest due to this primary source interviewing an actress from the film who has full understanding of the narrative.
Item 5 – A Cut above the rest by Peter Travers. From Rolling Stone 01.10.1991' Guest star Catherine O'Hara on the set of Beetlejuice'
This magazine article was produced in 1988 the year Beetlejuice was released. This magazine article is an extract from Toronto star interviewing an actress from the film, Catherine O'Hara. She goes into detail how some audiences have viewed the film and their favourite scene from Beetlejuice. She also states why specific characters had the personality they did, this is useful for my research investigation as Catherine O'Hara states the significance of being insecure, which foreshadows the narrative theme throughout my chosen Tim Burton films, Alienation. As an interview the opinions can be taken as truthful and honest due to this primary source interviewing an actress from the film who has full understanding of the narrative.
This magazine article is from an audience point of view on Tim Burtons style and themes he uses throughout his films, mainly Edward Scissor hands. This is quite useful for my research investigation due to the fact it helps make my presentation script by including opinions from different audiences as well as just my own and Tim Burton. Although this may help me make a stronger argument, I may not be able to rely on this without having further information from a reliable source which foreshadows the same reasoning's.
Item 6 - 'Scissorhands' cuts to Tim Burtons core by Susan Spilman from U.S.A today 12.10.1990
I have included this article is my research investigation because although it backs up most of my other references it also shows some differences into how Burton described himself, in some cases it may seem not as dramatic. However, I feel this is a good argument to use in my research as it helps me question Burtons recurring themes and if they do make hint an auteur. This questions if Tim Burton purposely uses the same techniques and themes to make him an auteur or if it is just coincidental to the genre of the films he produces.
Books
Item 7 - Teach yourself film studies - Warren Buckland
This book is extremely useful to my research as it is an informative book which is very easy to understand and apply to my research. It is aimed at beginners who are learning about all aspects of films studies and is useful to me as it dedicates two chapters to the auteur theory and the framework behind this and how it can be applied to my director. I can then use this throughout my presentation to refer to what auteur theory is to help evaluate if I think the resources I have gathered help me prove that he is.
Item 8 - Burton on Burton - Tim Burton ( 1995) pg 87
This book is extremely useful as the chapters are divided by each of his films and are from the directors point of view. It covers two of my focus films and allows me to see Tim Burtons view of his own films and also helps me to understand them, and gives reasoning behind key scenes and the mise-en-scene chosen and why this helped establish the key themes throughout, including my theme ( Alienation). Contextual information is provided on my focus films around the time they were released, which helps make this source more reliable. This is a very useful source because Burton on Burton also covers Burtons childhood in depth, explaining how it impacted his films and also goes over his own inspirations and directors he looked up to help make him the unique auteur he is claimed to be.
Item 9 - Fifty Contemporary Film makers - Yvonne Tasker ( pg. 79 )This book is extremely useful as the chapters are divided by each of his films and are from the directors point of view. It covers two of my focus films and allows me to see Tim Burtons view of his own films and also helps me to understand them, and gives reasoning behind key scenes and the mise-en-scene chosen and why this helped establish the key themes throughout, including my theme ( Alienation). Contextual information is provided on my focus films around the time they were released, which helps make this source more reliable. This is a very useful source because Burton on Burton also covers Burtons childhood in depth, explaining how it impacted his films and also goes over his own inspirations and directors he looked up to help make him the unique auteur he is claimed to be.
This book is quite useful to my presentation as it includes a chapter on Tim Burton as a film maker. This is useful because it talks about different technical codes and techniques he uses in his films, which create the specific theme of alienation through my focus films. I will be able to use this as examples of how he portrays these themes in his films, which is needed to make a valid statement on Burton being an auteur.
Item 10 - How to analyse the films of Tim Burton
This book gives a summary of what Tim Burtons life was like before becoming a film maker. This is useful to my research as I can use quotes at the beginning of my presentation script to help give a brief description of Tim Burton to the audience, so they can get a better understanding of the director. I will be very significant to what parts of this book I include as I will use quotes which will portray why his childhood and interests are significance to his director work later on in the presentation.
Internet
Item 11 – Senses
of Cinema
This website is quite useful as it has parts of Tim Burtons biography. It includes detailed descriptions of many films he has made and the personal reason for them. This is relevant to my research as it includes why Edward scissor hands physically looks the way he does and the importance of the miss-en-scene and visual aspect to his films and why this relates to his lonely teenage years.Item 12 – Tim Burton image
This is an image of Tim Burton, I will use this on the
cover of my presentation to help create a visual representation of the director, this will help the audience make their own judgement on if they see any recurring visual feature of the main characters in my chosen films to Tim Burton himself. This is particularly useful when going into depth of Edward Scissor Hands as there is a clear comparison between Edward and the director himself.
Item 13 - 'So the theory goes' This book features a counter-argument to the Auteur Theory , which I am going to use to argue against my answer as it is something that I have not yet considered to talk about in my presentation. However this also includes a very detailed description of what auteur theory is and what Tim Burton applies to this which could make him an auteur by what the theory suggests. I feel this is very useful to my presentation script due to the fact it makes my argument a lot stronger and more to suggest and talk about.
Item 14- SBBC film review
This film review includes ideas and opinions on occurring themes throughout Tim Burtons themes from his films such as Edward Scissor Hands and Alice in Wonderland. It includes detailed scene analysis of specific scenes in Edward Scissor Hands, which I can use to help argue why specific scenes show the alienation theme and how strong this determines my argument of Burton being an auteur. However, although this being a reliable blog, with references to the information used, I will be wary on how much of this information I will use because the opinions may not help me make a valid enough argument on its own.
Interviews
Item 15– interview
with king of quirk Tim Burton
This interview talks about Burton's childhood and how he grew up being quite a dark and isolated person, which he clearly used in his films such as Edward Scissor Hands and Alice in Wonderland. This is very useful to my research due to the fact Tim Burton is very personal in the interview to explain why the isolation of characters was so important to him, as he easily related to this in his own childhood.
This interview talks about Burton's childhood and how he grew up being quite a dark and isolated person, which he clearly used in his films such as Edward Scissor Hands and Alice in Wonderland. This is very useful to my research due to the fact Tim Burton is very personal in the interview to explain why the isolation of characters was so important to him, as he easily related to this in his own childhood.
Item 16 - Tim Burton interviewed by Scott Feinberg
In this interview Scott Feinberg chats with Tim burton about his life and his career as a director. I found this interview extremely useful because Tim Burton talks about his personal life at school and how he felt like the 'odd one out in class' due to him liking monster movies. This source one again highlights how significant Tim Burtons childhood was to his own narrative in his films as I feel this interview helps strengthen my point with my other reference to this in my previous interview.
Item 17 - A life in Pictures with Tim Burton
In this interview, Tim Burton once again is questioned on his childhood and how this may have related to this film. I feel in this interview Burton gave a good response to the questions and included detailed description into what his child hood was like, and maybe what is speculation about his childhood and what actually gave him the vision to create the films he did with the specific characters. I feel this interview is very useful because by comparing this with my other two interviews I can use various primary evidence to link his answers to emphasising the importance of my key theme for my question.
Documentaries
Item 18 - The films of Tim Burton
I'm going to use this show reel at the start of my presentation script to use a unique way to try and engage the audience to my topic and displaying some of the most popular films Tim Burton has created, including my focus films. This show reel was made by a massive Tim Burton fan on youtube which I feel is an interesting way to engaging the audience straight away. so they have a better understanding of some of the films Tim Burton has directed and his work as well as getting a minor insight into the themes he shows in his film.
Posters
Item (19 - 21) Film posters of my focus films ( Edward Scissorhands, Alice in Wonderland and Beetlejuice)
I am going to provide hand outs of these film posters in my presentation to give the audience a visual piece of work to look at regarding me research project. By showing the audience the three film posters of my chosen films, they can get a better understanding of what the film is about, if they have not already watched it, which will accompany my brief explanation of the films, so i can then chose scenes to go into depth to answer my question of if Tim Burton is classed as an auteur.
Rejected items
Film – Sweeney
Todd
Although this film does show some themes of alienation regarding the main character Sweeney, I feel that it is not as clearly show as the other films. I am also less familiar with this film, so I don't have as much of an in depth idea what themes the film consists of in comparison to Burtons other films. Before researching, I did have it as a possible choice for my three films however I found less useful information on this film than my other choices so I decided not to use it as a focus film. I feel i have a stronger knowledge and understanding of my other chosen films and I have a lot more reliable sources to shape a well written script which I found I just couldn't do with this film.
Although this film does show some themes of alienation regarding the main character Sweeney, I feel that it is not as clearly show as the other films. I am also less familiar with this film, so I don't have as much of an in depth idea what themes the film consists of in comparison to Burtons other films. Before researching, I did have it as a possible choice for my three films however I found less useful information on this film than my other choices so I decided not to use it as a focus film. I feel i have a stronger knowledge and understanding of my other chosen films and I have a lot more reliable sources to shape a well written script which I found I just couldn't do with this film.
I've also rejected this film because it does not directly focus on my question, although it does display some similarities and themes like other Tim Burton films, I have found it harder to find in depth research about this film and I feel this would have been harder to argue the auteur theory with this film rather than my three focus films.
Interview - Johnny Depp and Tim Burton interviews Face to Face
This interview goes into depth about the close relationship Tim Burton and Johnny Depp have. Although this interview is based around the films I have focused on, it does not mention on why the characters have been chosen or why they have been represented in a specific way, so this interview is irrelevant to my research.
Books - The works of Tim Burton
This book goes into depth about the gothic fairy-tale theme Tim Burton portrays in his films. Although this is a key theme used which can be suggested to make Tim Burton an auteur, it does not mention enough detail on the theme i am focusing on, to use this as a useful reference for my presentation script.
Article - BBC NEWS - Tim Burton ' I've never made a scary movie'
This article on the BBC news website, is the BBC interviewing Tim Burton. Unfortunately, Tim Burton did not talk about any of my focus films in this article due to the fact he is talking about a different theme, which also questions him being an auteur, the Gothic Fairy-tale. This focuses on the film 'Frankeweenie' and discusses how he does not think these films were scary for Disney. Overall, I have rejected this item in my presentation script due to the fact is does not have any relevance to my question.
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