Best Christmas Movies: Tim Burton Edition

Tim Burton is probably most known for his visual style, typically mashing up twisted and frightening images with the mundane world of American suburbia. Given the prevalence of ghosts, demons and creepity critters, Halloween is obviously his thematic holiday of choice, however it doesn’t take much digging to see that the guy has a major thing for Christmas. Almost all of his movies set at least some part of their action around the holiday season, so while he doesn’t make “Christmas” movies, per se, you can still find some truly innovative classics showing up around this time.

For my money, the best Christmas-ish movie that he’s done is Edward Scissorhands. I admit a certain amount of nostalgia blinds me a bit on this one – without going too far into the Ghosts of Clovis’ Past, I confess that the first date I ever went on was to see this movie. It also hits my sweet spot of showcasing characters that are essentially damaged beyond repair, but still trying to be something more than what they are.

Edward Scissorhands is a fairy tale about change and how to become something better, more beautiful. Edward, played by Johnny Depp, is a not-quite finished creation of a dead inventor, played by Vincent Price in his final role. Edward is shy and unsure, but has developed a talent for using the scissors he has for hands to make beautiful sculptures out of plants, bushes and ice. He’s trying to convert the loneliness and darkness of his life into something beautiful. Likewise, Winona Ryder’s Kim starts off as the “cool kid” cheerleader dating the controlling and violent Jim. Kim comes to love Edward after seeing beyond what’s on the surface and grows as a person because of it. But the most obvious example comes from the movie’s epilogue, where (spoilers!) an aging Kim tells the story of Edward to her young granddaughter on a cold winter night, explaining that before Edward came down from his mountaintop castle, it never snowed and afterwards it did, showcasing an entire community the manages to change and evolve after its involvement with someone new.

I’m a sucker for the visuals of the movie. Winona Ryder dancing in the snowfall created by Edward’s gigantic ice sculptures while Danny Elfman’s angelic score plays is easily the movie’s most iconic scene and absolutely the one that I look forward to every single time I watch it. I think I was lucky to see the movie as a very young teenager. The illustration of the simple and sweet love between Edward and Kim, uncomplicated by messy adult reality of the same emotion, is pretty much perfect for someone that age. Add in a very unsubtle dash of angst about connection and the inability to touch and hold someone, made literal by Edward’s hands, and you’ve got the perfect preteen emotional cocktail.

I'm 33 years old and this still melts my sad, bitter heart.

As such, it’s easy to see how Burton isn’t exactly hiding that this movie is a fantasy of himself and his own childhood. The nondescript suburban community tracks nicely with his own childhood in Burbank, California and Edward himself, wild-haired, shy, misunderstood artistic marvel that he is, is an obvious placeholder for how Burton sees himself. It’s that kind of nostalgia that so easily brings this movie into the Christmas movie pantheon, and not just because the final act is set on Christmas Eve. It aims for (and, largely, hits) all the same themes that traditional Christmas movies employ – innocence, family, love. Even Christmas cookies play a role.

The lessons and themes of Edward Scissorhands are not overly complex, but that doesn’t make them any less entertaining. Christmas movies are largely stuffed to the gills with sentimentality, from Dickens’ miserly Scrooge to modern family holiday flicks where everyone lives in a large country house and there’s always snow on the ground. We watch these movies to feel sentimental; to hope for, as Bing Crosby sang, a Christmas “just like the ones I used to know.” For me, who first saw this movie a few weeks before Christmas at age 13, it exactly fits the bill.

And even though it’s been over 20 years since I first saw this movie, I still listen to the Danny Elfman soundtrack every single bloody time it snows.

Recapping AHS: We Didn't Start The Fire

Sorry for the delay, all. Vacation got in the way. That means two AHS recaps for you this week! Hooray!

In 1994, Constance is serving a ridiculously candied ham to Tate, Addie and Burning Man in what I suppose is meant to be a family dinner. Tate offers to say grace, which in true angsty teenage grunge fashion, is pretty bitter, citing his father who “ran away” from the family and being grateful that his mother is shaking up with a man she doesn’t love who let his original family burn. Addie, either being the cutest or the slyest person, offers a hearty “Amen.” Burning Man says Tate will understand better when he’s older, meanwhile who wants tickets to Brigadoon next week? Tate blames Burning Man for killing Beau but Constance tells him to shut it. Because she’s awesome, Addie just keeps eating dinner. Later, Tate does lines of coke in his bedroom and retrieves a weapons stockpile from under his bed, including sniper rifle, because I guess he was planning on joining the Michigan Militia? Survivalist fantasies be damned, he instead goes to Burning Man’s office and douses him with gasoline, setting him on fire before heading off to the high school to get in touch with his inner Columbine.

Monday mornings at the office can really burn you, you know?

Act I! Ben comes to the hospital to apologize to Vivien and says that he knows she was raped and that the twins have two fathers. He says she can be released just as soon as they work out the “legal hiccups” of Vivien shooting Ben. Vivien refuses to return to the house. Elsewhere, detectives tell Constance that Travis is dead and show her the gruesome crime scene photos, because the LAPD is nothing if not sensitive. Back in the house, Ben is dealing with a sudden infestation of flies and is visited by a truancy officer who says Violet hasn’t been to school in 16 days. Ben tells Violet they can find her a new school, but she has to start going, which she agrees to. Constance visits Burning Man, pretending she just wants comfort but quickly pulling a knife on him and blaming him for killing Travis. Burning Man says he only moved the body and that one of the ghosts killed him. Constance realizes tells Burning Man she never loved him and that even dead, Travis is still twice the man. Burning Man says, “He is now.” Oh snap. Back home, Violet is leaving to go to school when Tate forcibly stops her from leaving the house. (I see where you’re going with this, show!) The detectives are back, suspecting that Constance, who doesn’t help her case by insulting the Korean race and then accidentally dropping the knife that she threatened Burning Man with from her purse.

Act II! Downtown, the detectives remark how people close to Constance seem to end up dead, like her three children, or missing, like her husband and Moira. A flashback reveals that Constance is the one who buried Moira’s body and she did it in her shoulder pads and high heels. Also, she ground up her husband’s body and fed it to her dogs in the basement. Constance is hardcore. Before the detectives can j’accuse her too much, they are shooed out by a lawyer, who, because he’s a new character, I’m betting will either end up dead in the basement or having sex with Vivien. At the house, an exterminator is checking the crawlspace under the house for the source of the flies. He discovers something that freaks him out, but before he can scramble out, he’s killed by Tate. While making his way up to the attic where Violet is hiding out, Tate overhears Ben talking with a boarding school. He tells Violet Ben wants to keep them apart, but he’s going to take care of it and then dons the Gimp suit to become Justice Man!

Act III! In the basement, Burning Man is recovering Travis’ clothes. (Sidebar, how thick are the walls in this house that ALL these people can get in without anyone in other rooms hearing them?) Travis wants to know if he’s made the news and Burning Man tells him they’re now referring to him as the “Boy Dahlia”. They’re interrupted by two burned little girls playing tea party in the corner, who ask Travis to come back to play. As Burning Man watches them, his still-smoldering wife comments on how good Travis is with the girls, marking yet another time in Burning Man’s life where Travis has upstaged him with people he cares about. Burning Man asks why he’s finally seeing his family now, after all this time. His wife tells him that he’s “on the cusp” and it’s about as sweet of a scene as you can have with four people who are literally burned to death. Burning Man says he’ll make Constance pay for what she did, but his wife reminds him that Constance isn’t the responsible one. Cut to Ben naked in the shower, a return to earlier themes, when he is suddenly attacked by GimpTate. They tussle and Ben manages to unmask Tate just as he is losing consciousness from chloroform. Man, Hollywood loves that stuff, don’t they?

Pictured: The moment this show admitted it's just a vehicle for all your Dylan McDermott S&M fantasies.

In the attic, Tate tries to convince Violet to commit suicide with him, “like Romeo and Juliet”. Violet seems to agree, but then tries to get away from Tate. She runs outside and calls for help, but the passing couple on the street doesn’t hear her, although their dog does. She tries to run off the grounds, but is instantly back in the kitchen. She tries multiple times to leave, but always comes back to the house. She tells Tate she doesn’t want to die, but he says “it’s too late for that.” I TOTALLY CALLED THIS ONE! MUST CREDIT CLOVIS!

Act IV! Tate takes Violet to the basement crawlspace and shows her the source of all those flies – it’s her rapidly decaying body. She died back in the bathtub with that suicide “attempt.” Downtown, the detectives tell Constance that Burning Man has confessed to Travis’s murder and want to know if she can help ascertain his motive. Constance suggests he confessed to pacify his guilty conscience. Back in Violet’s room, Tate and Violet discuss the practicalities of dating while dead. Neither actually remember dying, but Tate says it’s okay because now they’ll be together forever. It’s not clear if Violet’s all that thrilled about this. In jail, and hilariously next to a “no smoking” sign, Burning Man tells Constance he confessed because he needs to pay for his crimes with her. Constance tells him, “You’re going to die in here.”

Next time – BABIES!!!