Sunday, April 5, 2009

On Tim Burton

*Skip to the last paragraph if you're short on time*

Don't get me wrong, Time Burton seems like a nice enough guy. I'll applaud any pale skinny dude with scraggly hair who can bag a chick as crazyhot as Helena Bonham Carter. They're like an adorable pair of rejects from a Neil Gaiman story.

But here's the thing: short of Nightmare Before Christmas and Beetle Juice, I've never really enjoyed a Burton film.

I know, I know – blasphemy – but I mean it. I can't stand his visual style. Everything the man creates looks like the acid flashbacks of a Manson Family member. I can't get past it and really this is a valid criticism of a filmmaker. I understand it's just personal style, but I'm not going to discount my opinion either, because I don't feel Burton deserves half the credit he's given.

First off, I'll concede Edward Scissorhands and Big Fish, which I have only not seen because I can't look at a Burton film without getting a headache but am told they are bother very good movies if you ignore that they have very thinly veiled morals. I will also discount as a guy I know who loves both theater and Burton admitted that it was wonderful but less wonderful than the play, whereas I totally wanted to bang the strung out bitch from Sweaney ToddFight Club until I found out she's long-term committed to Burton's greasey head.

While very simple and silly when not downright stupid, open satire of former Cold War politics, Mars Attacks was pretty good (as long as you keep the above in mind).

Now I upset a different type of nerd: Burton's Batman films sucked ass. Yes, they ruined the public conception of Batman almost as much as the old Adam West series. Batman is class and a boot in your ass. He is not campy, he does not have bat-nipples and Gotham city is not made of 60% neon. I can fully blame Batman Forever, Batman & Robin and Catwoman on Tim Burton, due to the uneducated popularity of his magnum opus to eighties mentality fucking over everything good in America. Take a look at Batman Begins and The Dark Knight and you see what Batman used to be and what he finally is again. Since Burton filmed his movies after Frank Miller released "The Dark Knight Returns" and "Year One" there's just no excuse.

To anyone who doubts any of what I just said, I invalidate and/or counterbalance your claims with the following words: Sleepy Hollow, Planet of the Apes.

Honestly, he doesn't seem like a bad guy. Maybe he just got mocked in the hallway too muh in high school. Maybe Debbie Harris laughed in his face or knocked over his D&D sourcebook/sketch pad when he asked her to Junior prom. I really don't care. All I'm really saying is Burton makes all these movies that rip off other people's ideas, and not well. If you check his filmography, exactly half of Burton's films are original while the other half are adaptations and remakes, and I've never heard anyone who likes his remakes better than the originals.

All I'm saying is Burton needs to stop beating around the bush and just make the film he's really wanted to make since 1990: a 90-minute suckfest of him gobbling Johnny Depp's nob like his spunk holds the cure for cancer.

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