Top 10 Tim Burton Movies

Tim Burton is a divisive filmmaker. People seem to either really like his work or completely despise it. There isn't much middle ground. This hasn't gotten easier in the last few years as most of his output has ranged from mediocre to terrible, coming across more as ads for Hot Topic merchandise and artistic masturbation on his part. Thankfully, this trend looks like it'll reverse this year with the silly supernatural soap opera Dark Shadows (which I'll have a review of in a few days) and Burton's return to stop-motion animation with Frankenweenie. 


So in honor of Dark Shadows release this weekend, I present

The Top 10 Tim Burton Movies

10. The Nightmare Before Christmas


Okay, I'm kind of cheating with this one. Technically, The Nightmare Before Christmas isn't a Tim Burton movie in that he didn't direct it. He just produced it and wrote it. That's why I put at the bottom. But it's got enough of his personal style in it that I really don't feel bad putting it on this list. Plus I love this movie. I watch it every Christmas and Halloween and have since I was in single digits. I remember having the VHS in the black plastic clamshell box, those were awesome. But besides my nostalgic feelings, Nightmare is still good enough to qualify. Contrasting Christmas and Halloween, arguably the two biggest commercial holidays, and using the goofy macabre fun of one to parody the overly saccharine and sentimental atmosphere of the other is kind of brilliant and leads to some great humor. Add in some great Danny Elfman songs and you've got a holiday classic for all those black sheep out there.

9. Sleepy Hollow


A lot of people don't like this movie and I don't get why. It's so fun. It's a goofy gothic murder mystery dripping with an old-school Hammer Horror look.  But I think what works is that it isn't ironic. It's silly as all hell, but it doesn't feel the need to wink at the audience and point out how silly it is. They play it all straight. And when you do a very retro movie like this, that's usually the best approach. It's also one of those movies where Burton gets a bunch of talented actors and just lets them be ridiculous. It's just really entertaining, the perfect kind of movie to watch on cable on a Saturday night. And it's got Christopher Walken as the Headless Horseman. How can you not love that?

8. Mars Attacks!


This is another Burton movie I find people don't like. I can see why with this one though. Mars Attacks! is kind of all over the place, some of its plotlines don't pay off, and a few of the actors are phoning it in. But I think it's important to remember what this movie is trying to make fun of. Burton is one of those directors that are at their best when aping the past, and Mars Attacks! is aping the cheesy old sci-fi movies of the '50s. Its garish color palette reflects the high-saturated technicolor prints of the past and the designs of its aliens and spaceships and even its plot are just as retro. This is a movie about Martians attacking Earth, made after we knew there weren't any Martians. And like Sleepy Hollow, it's another good movie for playing Hey, it's that guy! If you've passed this over before, give it another look. If only for one of the best evil aliens on film.

7. Batman


What else is there to say? While the comics may have brought back Batman back to his gothic roots first, Burton put the "dark" in the Dark Knight for the general public in 1989. Putting to rest memories of Adam West (who isn't that bad in retrospect, but that's another post), Batman showed us the dark smoky German expressionist world of Gotham City and its strange protector. It's especially interesting to look at this movie now after The Dark Knight gave us a different look at Batman and The Joker. Keaton and Nicholson's takes are unlike either Bale and Ledger's, but all their performances have something essential about the characters to them. Which movie is more faithful to the comic? Neither, and it doesn't really matter. Batman brought a degree of seriousness to superheroes audiences hadn't seen before, and without it we probably wouldn't have gotten The Dark Knight.

6. Batman Returns


That's right, I'm putting Batman Returns over Batman. Everybody else says the first one's better, but I prefer the sequel. But that's probably only because of the villains. Yeah, this is probably the movie that set the Batman franchise down the road of focusing more on the villains than Batman, but I'll let it slide in this case. I love both of these performances. Danny DeVito's deranged Penguin just chews the scenery in the most delightfully hammy way. He's just so weird and disgusting but he keeps striving for some legitimacy and class, which is an important aspect of the character. And Michelle Pfeiffer's Catwoman. Oh god, Michelle Pfeiffer's Catwoman. Besides just filling out that vinyl catsuit, she really plays up that fetishy BDSM aspect of Batman. The idea of these two people who are so restrained and quiet in their normal lives slipping into these tight black costumes and alter egos to let out all their pent up energy and frustrations. I can't wait to see what Chris Nolan and Anne Hathaway do with her in Dark Knight Rises.

5. Corpse Bride


And here's the official Tim Burton stop-motion movie. And it's pretty good. I'll admit, I was very skeptical of this movie when I first saw it but damn if I wasn't surprised. Corpse Bride is an odd little movie to be sure, but I think it's the best sort of fairy tale story about lonely outcasts that Burton can pull off very well. It's a simple story bolstered by good performances done with a playfulness Burton doesn't use much anymore. And it's miles ahead of the other Burton movie that came out in '05.

Ughhhhh........

4. Beetlejuice


Let's face it, the best thing about this movie is Michael Keaton's performance. He's kind of the blueprint for every fast-talking pop culture-spouting slobby dick to come after. Unlike most of them, he's actually funny. It's in the contrast really. He just clashes with everybody else in this movie. He doesn't fit with the old-fashioned simplicity of Adam Baldwin & Geena Davis. He doesn't fit with the high-brow pretension of Jeffrey Jones and Catherine O'Hara. He doesn't fit with the boring bureaucracy of the underworld. He doesn't even fit with Winona Ryder's quirky goth character. Beetlejuice is just this hyperactive little imp, wanting nothing more than to shoot his id over any poor bastard in his way. It's just wickedly entertaining.

3. Edward Scissorhands


This is pretty much the Tim Burton movie. All of the different tropes he uses and artistic stamps are here and probably done their best. Lonely outcast? Check. Gothic designs? Check. utilizing the aesthetics of the past? Check. Fairy tale story? Double check. All of Burton's signature artistic flourishes anchored by an incredible performance by Johnny Depp. It's a beautiful film and if you haven't seen it, fix that immediately.

2. Sweeney Todd


Okay, Edward Scissorhands is a better movie than this one. But this is a personal list and I really like this movie. I think it's because most musicals are (or at least seem like) light fluffy affairs with contrived happy endings. And there's this, a musical about murder, revenge, and cannibalism where everybody dies in the end. Awesome. And I think Tim Burton agrees with me. Despite his macabre sensibilities, Burton is a pretty upbeat optimistic director most of the time. But with Sweeney Todd, he seems to be using the already grim subject matter as an excuse to let out his more cynical dark side. Good music, good performances, and a great look make this blackly funny musical a bloody good time.

I'm sorry for that pun.

1. Ed Wood


This is, without a doubt, the best movie about movies ever. In case you are unaware, Ed Wood was a low-budget filmmaker from back in the '50s who made what is considered the worst movie ever made, Plan 9 From Outer Space. But what Wood may have lacked in talent, he made up for with passion. While his movies weren't good, you couldn't honestly call bad or at least unentertaining. You could just feel the love and passion he put into the movie in despite of his directorial incompetence. And Burton puts that same passion and love into this movie, telling the story of a strange man in a strange business and showing the trials and travails of the creative process. Ed Wood may have been a weird dude and Plan 9 may have been a crappy movie, but this movie will get you to love them all the same. If you consider yourself a movie buff and haven't seen this, give it a watch. I guarantee you won't be disappointed.

Oh, one last thing. Overall, Alice in Wonderland was pretty crappy. But Stephen Fry as the Cheshire Cat? Wicked Awesome. That is all.