Cinematic Techniques In Tim Burton's Movies

Throughout Tim Burton’s movies, you can see his techniques evolve and become what is known as Tim Burton’s style. Burton’s movies have become a popular style, and his movies always bring crowds to the theaters. His fame grew with the production of Edward Scissorhands, from then, his techniques only grew, developing into his own unique style that many try to imitate. Several of his most obvious and aggressive techniques are his use of lighting, music, and colors. I am using several examples from his movies, Edward Scissorhands, Big fish, and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. In this essay, I will be analyzing and discussing Tim Burton’s cinematic techniques.

In Burton’s films, he uses many lightings to portray numerous specific moods.
A dark Tim Burton movie is what people expect and having a dark mood, most likely leads to the conclusion of a Tim Burton film. In Edward Scissorhands, the lightings in the castles and the neighborhood in the beginning portray that something is suspicious about the castle and it's inhabitants. Using a dark lighting to create a mood of mystery and suspicion around the castle establishes a curiosity as well as a fear of the castle while keeping the town brightly lit and sunny to depict a light mood. In Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Burton uses a contrast from the gray, cloudy, and thick lighting, to the light, bright, colorful mood, inside the factory, to show that the factory is a nice and fluffy place to be. In Big fish, the use of lighting during Bloom’s adventure on his way to Spectre, the trail is dark and the lighting is dark and dense at the same time. It depicts a mood of fear and danger. Lighting is an important factor in any mood, whatever it may be, and Burton knows how to harness the power light.

In all of Tim Burton’s films, music plays an important role in representing his moods in any of his movies, but the subtle integration and volumes truly adds countless variables to any movie.