I normally don’t really like Halloween movies (probably because I’m not a big fan of horror movies), but I wanted to get into the Halloween spirit, so I decided to watch Frankenweenie. I knew it could not be that scary, because I remember it being advertised as a children’s movie when it was first released, and I was right. I was a bit creepy at times, just by the very nature of Burton’s stop-motion animation style and the fact that it was about bringing the dead back to life, but it wasn’t dreadful to watch the way most “scary” movies are. It was actually a lot of fun to watch, especially if you like Tim Burton’s other work.
One of Tim Burton’s most famous characteristics is the creepy, dead-looking appearance most of his characters have. I really love this character design, mostly because it honestly reminds me of myself. I’m pretty pale with black hair and have dark circles under my eyes, which is basically an exact description of most of Burton’s iconic characters, including nearly every character in Frankenweenie. I like how he makes this an aesthetic, something cool and desirable and interesting. Overall, the eternal Halloween of Burton’s films, that the character design is so crucial to, is so unique and interesting, and I love it dearly.
The movie is a big improvement from the half-hour short from 1984 of the same name that Frankenweenie is based on. The original short had real actors, but I think this story is much better told with stop-motion animation. It is hard to believe that a real dog in makeup was brought back from the dead, but when you see the puppet all stitched up and nearly falling apart, it feels much more real. Also, the added characters contributed a lot to the story as a whole. Because the original was so short, the only character that really had a significant amount of screen time was the protagonist, Victor. However, with the movie, many of the people around Victor, especially his classmates, get more development, which is much better. Also, the plot in general gets a lot more development. For example, it is made clear in the movie that thunderstorms are very common in New Holland (which wasn’t even named in the short), so the lightning that brought Sparky back wasn’t a freak occurrence, but a common one that Victor could have counted on. This kind of depth was not even present in the short, but was everywhere in the feature-length film.
5 stars
I normally don’t really like Halloween movies (probably because I’m not a big fan of horror movies), but I wanted to get into the Halloween spirit, so I decided to watch Frankenweenie. I knew it could not be that scary, because I remember it being advertised as a children’s movie when it was first released, and I was right. I was a bit creepy at times, just by the very nature of Burton’s stop-motion animation style and the fact that it was about bringing the dead back to life, but it wasn’t dreadful to watch the way most “scary” movies are. It was actually a lot of fun to watch, especially if you like Tim Burton’s other work.
One of Tim Burton’s most famous characteristics is the creepy, dead-looking appearance most of his characters have. I really love this character design, mostly because it honestly reminds me of myself. I’m pretty pale with black hair and have dark circles under my eyes, which is basically an exact description of most of Burton’s iconic characters, including nearly every character in Frankenweenie. I like how he makes this an aesthetic, something cool and desirable and interesting. Overall, the eternal Halloween of Burton’s films, that the character design is so crucial to, is so unique and interesting, and I love it dearly.
The movie is a big improvement from the half-hour short from 1984 of the same name that Frankenweenie is based on. The original short had real actors, but I think this story is much better told with stop-motion animation. It is hard to believe that a real dog in makeup was brought back from the dead, but when you see the puppet all stitched up and nearly falling apart, it feels much more real. Also, the added characters contributed a lot to the story as a whole. Because the original was so short, the only character that really had a significant amount of screen time was the protagonist, Victor. However, with the movie, many of the people around Victor, especially his classmates, get more development, which is much better. Also, the plot in general gets a lot more development. For example, it is made clear in the movie that thunderstorms are very common in New Holland (which wasn’t even named in the short), so the lightning that brought Sparky back wasn’t a freak occurrence, but a common one that Victor could have counted on. This kind of depth was not even present in the short, but was everywhere in the feature-length film.