Tim Burton - Movie Director

Tim Burton - Movie Director

Tim Burton is recognized as an accomplished director, producer, and writer has also been identified as a talented animator, artist, and photographer (Tim Burton FAQ). He was born in 1958 in Burbank, California and enjoyed watching classic horror films and cartoons as a small child (Tim Burton). His favorite monster movies included Godzilla, the Hammer horror films from Great Britain, and the work of Ray Harryhausen (Jackson and McDermott, 2004). One of Burton's heroes was actor Vincent Price. In the ninth grade, he won a prize for an anti-litter poster he designed for local garbage trucks (Tim Burton). After high school in 1976, Burton attended the Cal Arts Institute on a Disney scholarship.

Upon graduation, Burton joined Walt Disney Studios as an animator and worked on projects such as the Fox and the Hound, The Black Cauldron, Vincent and Frankenweenie (Tim Burton). Vincent was a success and won two awards from the Chicago Film Festival. However, Burton found animation work too boring and structured and left Disney to pursue live-action films (Jackson and McDermott, 2004).

The results of Burton's career change were more than a decade of top-box office hits (Tim Burton). He directed his first feature film, Pee-wee's Big Adventure in 1985. Three years later came Beetlejuice, a comedy about a New England family haunted by a ghost that resembled a live action cartoon (Tim Burton). In 1989, Burton directed Batman, for which he won the Director of the Year Award from the National Association of Theater owners. In 1990, Burton directed and produced Edward Scissorhands, a suburban fairly tale. And, in 1992, Burton directed a highly successful sequel to Batman, Batman Returns.

The year 1994, would also see another hit with Burton's production and direction of Ed Wood featuring a cross-dressing movie director followed by the sci-fi comedy, Mars Attacks! In 1996. Burton closed the decade with Sleepy Hollow -- a loose adaptation of Washington Irving's classic short story The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (Andac).

Amazingly, all of the movies mentioned above ranked in the top ten at the box office. Batman was the most financially lucrative with a number one box-office rating and a total gross of just over $251 million followed by Batman Returns with a number two box-office rating and a total gross of nearly $163 million. Ed Wood was the least successful and came in at number nine at the box office and grossed about $5.8 million (Tim Burton FAQ).