Film Review
When Johnny Depp first read the script for
Edward Scissorhands, he 'cried like a
newborn'. As you watch the film, director Tim Burton's most
personal and most inspired work to date, it is hard not to follow the
actor's example. Inspired by Mary Shelley's
Frankenstein story,
Edward Scissorhands offers a
beguiling mix of fable and fairytale dealing with universal themes of
loneliness, identity and tolerance, in a way that is both witty and
moving. Burton's flair for visual storytelling is matched by some
superb screenwriting and acting, making this an inventive and
insightful study in the age-old conflict between self-realisation and
social acceptance.
Edward
Scissorhands makes the perfect companion piece to Burton's next
film but one,
Ed Wood (1994), which also
features a misunderstood tragic outsider who fails to achieve approval
and who, coincidentally, is also named Edward.
The concept for the film grew out of Burton's own unhappy childhood in
Burbank, California. The character Edward Scissorhands, a punk
variation of the Frankenstein monster, might be Burton himself, an artist
endlessly striving to realise his creative vision within the limiting
constraints of mainstream cinema, but it could equally be any one of
us. Whilst
Frankenstein
is the film's most obvious reference, it happily pillages many
other films and literary sources, from
Beauty and the Beast to
The Phantom of the Opera.
David Lynch's films
The Elephant Man (1980) and
Blue Velvet (1986) are
frequently alluded to, both in the main character (a sensitive social
outcast who struggles to gain acceptance), and in the cosy suburban
setting, which turns out to be much weirder than we might first
suspect.
Johnny Depp, already a teen idol thanks to his appearances in the
popular American crime television series
21 Jump Street, was a perfect
casting choice for the part of Edward Scissorhands - his most
challenging role, and one in which he delivers one of his most engaging
performances. Incredible to think that Depp was not the
frontrunner for the role - the executives at Twentieth Century-Fox were
keen to hire Tom Cruise, but when he turned down the offer several
other A-list actors were considered (Tom Hanks, William Hunt and Robert
Downey, Jr.) before Tim Burton managed to convince his profit-conscious
paymasters that Depp was by far the best man for the role.
Burton's instincts proved to be spot on. Depp brings such
vulnerability and gentleness to his portrayal that only a soulless lump of marble
could fail to
engage with his bewildered, scissor-handed innocent, who is more
Pinocchio than Frankenstein's monster. Edward's clumsy but
well-meaning attempts to fit in with his adopted family are as humorous
as they are poignant, and Depp does a remarkably fine job of revealing
the fragile soul beneath the mechanical shell, conveying so much with
hardly any dialogue.
Winona Ryder (Depp's real-life partner at the time) is equally
enchanting as Edward's love interest - her scenes with Depp are the
most lyrical and the most moving in the film, pure fairytale. The
magnificent Dianne Wiest comes pretty close to stealing the entire film
as the intimidating Avon lady who thinks nothing of adopting a
mechanical boy with razor-sharp metal shards for fingers (she has
clearly never watched any of the
Nightmare
on Elm Street films). The most distinguished name in the
castlist is that of veteran horror star Vincent Price, who makes a
pleasing cameo appearance as Edward's reclusive inventor. A
lifelong fan of Price, Tim Burton created the character especially for
him and it turned out to be the actor's final film role. How
fitting that Vincent Price should bow out in style, in the setting
where he appears to be most at home - that of a dark, echoing Gothic
castle, the iconic bridgehead between science and the supernatural.
If you can see past its fairytale whimsy and unsettling fusion of
comicbook fantasy with soap-style normality, it readily becomes
apparent that
Edward Scissorhands
is a far more sophisticated and substantial film than is first
evident. It is a film that admits multiple interpretations and
says so much about ourselves and how we relate to others.
Primarily, it seems to be a dark parable about how society deals with
those who, for whatever reason, don't quite fit in. Groups of
human beings tend to prefer conformity to eccentricity; those who do
not conform are considered dangerous, a threat to the harmony of the
group. Yet it is the eccentrics who provide the most value to
society - these are the artists, the scientists, and other imaginative
types on whom civilisation depends for progress.
Edward Scissorhands shows us how a
close-knit community can be improved by the arrival of someone who is
so obviously different from the norm, but it concludes (depressingly)
with the community closing ranks and rejecting the colourful
outsider. Dinosaur-themed topiary may not be to everyone's taste,
but it is hard to deny that a society which accepts Edward Scissorhands
is a good deal healthier than one which shuns him and drives him back
into his lonely Gothic mansion.
© James Travers 2012
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