Cranky Critic® StarTalk Interviews: Tim Burton

It's true that director Tim Burton has made some bright, colorful movies in his career, but the ones we prefer are the darker ones -- Batman and Edward Scissorshands come to mind. Burton himself told us of his love for Hammer Horror films and their "cathartic" impact upon his life, when we sat down to talk with him about Sleepy Hollow, an expanded and very cool looking version of the story by Washington Irving. Johnny Depp and Christina Ricci star and, while the mystery of the Headless Horseman is still central to the tale, this version is more a murder mystery stuffed with cool effects (by ILM) and dynamite battles (staged by Nick Gillard and Ray Park). The Horseman himself is spit into this world from the roots of an old tree -- a portal to hell . . .

Tim Burton: I have fun with that kind of stuff. Part of my inspiration was growing up with monster movies. A lot of the ones I liked, you're struck by very strong imagery. A lot of the Hammer horror films are those kind of films where the images sort of burn in your consciousness. They were like fairy tales. They were so strong. What they were so good at was bringing back that beautiful, lurid horror movie. Horror movies have always been around but they seemed to have lost that beauty, in a way. Hammer captured that lurid, sexy, beautiful quality. I remember when I read the Sleepy Hollow script, thinking of the windmill and the tree and the Headless Horseman. It was a real opportunity to try to do that imagery. It was like trying to make a great sculpture. I just thought it was fun.

CrankyCritic: It was a dynamite idea to include Christopher Lee in the cast.
Tim Burton: Oh, man. I met him and it was like "I'm meeting Dracula!" I sit down with him and two hours go by and, y'know, you're sitting with Dracula! He's so intense. I was so happy that he did Sleepy Hollow because I felt like he started the movie off on the right foot. He's got that presence, you know?

CrankyCritic: And once again you're working with Johnny Depp.
Tim Burton: I just enjoy working with him. I like actors that like to transform and he's a real transformer. He doesn't really care how he looks. He's willing to try anything. It just makes the process exciting and easier for me. It's always exciting to see him do a different character each time.

CrankyCritic: So why didn't you make Depp look more like the Ichabod Crane that Washington Irving described?
Tim Burton: Johnny wanted to but we said "No." What was important to me, though we changed things, was the character traits of Ichabod. We tried to be respectful of his eccentricities, his squeamishness and odd behavior. I think Johnny did that very well. The thing I appreciate about his performance, most of all, is his subtle, squeamish expressions. I think if we had made him look more makeup-y, those things would have gotten lost. There was plenty of makeup in the movie as it was, so we didn't need more.

CrankyCritic: What was right about Christina Ricci for this role?
Tim Burton: Christina is like a silent movie actress. All you have to do is look at her. She brings this great ambiguous quality. All she has to do is look at you and you get this feeling ... but you don't know what it is. You don't know if she likes you or hates you. I like it because it's a real mysterious quality. You can't ask somebody to do that, you know what I mean? You either have it or you don't.

CrankyCritic: The big change to Washington Irving's original story is that now it's a murder mystery.
Tim Burton: That was in the script when I first got it. Sleepy Hollow obviously differs from the original story but the original is short story; what I got out of the original was a sense of atmosphere, of romantic horror and fable legend. The image of the Horseman and the great names of the characters. The eccentricities of Ichabod and his separateness. Those were the things that we felt we wanted to keep true to and that we could expand upon.
CrankyCritic: There's a lot of darkness to this story
Tim Burton: I didn't consciously think about that. Like what the Hammers did and like the old Grimm's Fairy Tales, they go for it. There's a purity to them that is great. A lot of those early fairy tales are quite shocking and quite scary and do things that are worse than anything in Sleepy Hollow. We say here's a Headless Horseman and he's not the Avon lady. We didn't go out of our way to make it anything but what it was

CrankyCritic: Was there pressure to tone down the story to a PG-13 rating? Are you disappointed that the MPAA gave you an [R]?
Tim Burton: Oh, yeah. I've had trouble with the Ratings Board from the beginning. We knew early on that there was nothing we could do. We all wanted a PG-13 -- we all think it is. I would have no trouble showing this movie to some kids. Kids are like adults. Some can take it, some can't. Everybody has a choice. I was disappointed but I was also grateful to the Studio that they accepted it. There was nothing we could do to soften it. You get penalized; if we did the exact same thing and did it really badly it probably would have gotten a PG-13. But you try to do something and you try to give it some power, you get penalized for it. It doesn't make any sense. I don't find much logic to it.
CrankyCritic: It must have blown you away when they rejected the original poster
Tim Burton: Oh, you heard about that? They said that we could not have the Headless Horseman on the poster.
CrankyCritic: Because...?
Tim Burton: Because it was too frightening. So what do you do? Ban the Disney cartoon? And it gets even more perverse. Finally, they allowed us to put a little headless horseman on the poster. It's like a joke, OK? So last week I'm driving around and I see on the bus stops this poster of a huge headless horseman in front of the moon. I thought "What the hell is that?" and it's one of these knock offs. This religious owned [cable] station has a giant Headless Horseman on a poster. We cannot have the Headless Horseman on a poster. It doesn't make any sense. I get very upset about it. It's weird to me. With all the talk of violence, and it's a legitimate concern, I look at my own upbringing. I look at the fact that I could see Hammer horror films on TV on a Saturday afternoon. Now, they wouldn't allow it. There are PG-13 movies that have a lot more violence, impalings and things, than [the movies] I grew up watching. It just doesn't make any sense.

CrankyCritic: Don't we adults have to protect the kidlets from violence?
Tim Burton: Where is this "new" violence coming from? All the talk rarely gets to the root of the problem. The easy targets are movies and music. They talk about it like we're in some sort of Communist country where you don't have a choice of what you see, y'know. I have a certain problem with certain kinds of violence where people are joking and shooting guns; a cavalier approach to it. The way the news is presented as entertainment. That's where it's all twisted up, to me.

CrankyCritic: Let's change topics. You built Aurora model kits as a kid, right?
Tim Burton: Oh, yeah. That was about the level I could deal with. I had all the monsters ones. Yeah.
CrankyCritic: The majority of your films seem to stem from childhood inspirations
Tim Burton: That's the era; everybody's formed early on in positive and negative ways. I think the positive way for me; I was formed by those movies. It's part of why I want to do it. It's part of what feeds me, creatively, I guess.

CrankyCritic: And from your movies, we assumed you were a dark and gloomy guy...
Tim Burton: I never understood that. I understand certain elements in the films but I always felt very positive. A movie like Seven, that's dark to me. I am not a dark person. I don't consider myself dark.

CrankyCritic: There's a windmill scene at the end os Sleepy Hollow that feels like an homage to James Whalen?
Tim Burton: Yeah. James Whalen was another one that; even as a child you knew his movies had a lot of depth to them. His mix of humor and horror and metaphor. He was a great folk tale teller. Frankenstein is one of the first movies I remember seeing.

CrankyCritic: You can tell me I'm reading too much into this, but the first thing that went through my head when I saw Depp with his gear on, was Thomas Dolby's first record.
Tim Burton: [Burton giggles. Loudly]. No, I did not make that connection but that's OK. Listen. Make any connection you want. The great thing about film is that you plan a lot of stuff and then stuff happens. That, to me, is the most magical thing. That's what I love about film. Thomas Dolby, huh? I'll have to look at that now.