“Tim Burton Interviewed on The Treatment”

The guest being interview is Tim Burton was born Timothy Walter Burton and attended California Institute of the Arts where he learned of his love in hand made artistry. He is a well-known filmmaker whose extraordinary visual artistic talents are well displayed in every movie he makes. These talents include stop motion animation that can be seen in live action and animation movies. He also makes movies where the focus is based on a misunderstood outcast or loner. Some of the movies he has direction and/or produce are: Pee-Wee Big Adventure (1985), Beetlejuice (1988), Edward Scissorhands (1990), Big Fish (2003), Corpse Bride (2005), and most current Frankenweenie (2012). The date the interviewed was conducted on The Treatment was Wednesday, February 15, 2006.

Tim Burton has always been a favorite director of mine since I first saw his films Pee-Wee Big Adventure and Edward Scissorhands. His stop motion animation has been a favorite aspect to viewing his movies, that when I got to see some of the sets on display at Disneyland including the clay models he used, for his current film Frankenweenie, I was truly amazed. The details of each clay model characters and sets provided were the exactly the same as if they were really people in makeup or the sets were build to life size. It was not said, but I wonder if the first Frankenweenie live action short 27 min film, he did in 1984 had a influence on creating this animated film? The interview provided a lot of knowledge I didn’t know before such as where he went to school and how Ray Harryhausen introduced him to the handmade artistry of animation. Tim Burton seem very relax in his interview and was willing to share a personal side of him to gain a inside to why and how he films his unique style of movies. I was also rather surprised by the symbolic meanings he also puts in to every film he makes, don’t be judgmental of people who are different. 

When studying animation at Cal Arts, he has professors who had worked at Disney on the classic Disney films, such as Snow White. The professors expressed how it’s necessary to learn different ways to illustrate, design, and learn the traits of the craft. To quote Tim Burton, “You learn to have passion towards the art…you are reminded it is a business, but never lose the passion and the artist you have for it”. This is very true in the film business, with the advance of computers and technology people are losing site of what they love about making a film and just going with the appeals to the public and sells the film. Sometimes big blockbusters often fail compare to B type movies, because they didn’t focus on plot and getting their overall message across, their main focus was spending as much as they can on CGI and other special effecting neglecting all else.

This is why I believe Tim Burton does a lot of Fantasy movies. He is able to hold on to his passion and not fall in to business only part of the trait. When asked during the interview, about how he does a lot of fantasy and live action, he remarks about fantasy, “you don’t need to so literal about life and death, its more about two sides of life…repress vs. the open and artistic” He treats each film as a symbolic meaning though his characters, sets, and plot. He goes with his passion of showing that there are two sides to every story. The outcast may not be an outcast after all; people are just not connecting with their ways of thinking, or living life. You must look at the whole story, and go back to his message of not judging a person by their lifestyle, or looks.

Tim Burton makes a great statement about storyboards in his interview, which I think helps make his movies that much better. In the movie, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, even though its gothic like, you can personalize with all the characters during each scene as they see the chocolate factory for the first time and all the adventures it hold for them on the inside. He states, “I used to storyboard a lot, and I don’t as much, once you start working with actors, you start working with good improvisation style of actors, it opens your mind not to rely on storyboards”.  By using this technique in filming a movie, allowing for the actors to do as they please to a certain extreme, then it helps bring a point across you are trying to give. When looking at other movies as well, his overall message is to not be judgmental, so by trusting the actors to do improvisation in certain scenes, to get a point across that might now have been good in a storyboard drawing, is a great thing to do, and has work well for him.

           In conclusion I loved this interview done with Tim Burton. It opened my mind to the meaning behind his type of film making. He does a fantastic making the audience feel for the outcast or non-normal person in all his movies. He is as master at using stop motion animated in most of his movies. In today’s world where there is so much bulling and hatred, his overall message of trying to stop the labeling of people and being narrow minded, to being more open minded by stressing this in symbolic form in his movies. I have gain more respect for Tim Burton and understand why he films the types of movies he does. 

Some of the photos I took from the exhibition: 

a kitchen scene with such details as working lights and food on the table and in the oven. 

the school room set with clay model characters.