On the Outside Looking In

Maybe Jack Skellington’s large, empty eyes were Tim Burton’s way of not allowing anyone to see into his soul. (We did anyway!) In Big Eyes, Burton’s most recent work of art, we are invited to dive into those big, sorrowful eyes; not the ones that Margaret Keane painted on her waif-like children, but those of the artist herself, her soul, remarkably well portrayed here by Amy Adams at her best.

Tim Burton has outdone himself in this film. The film concentrates many aspects of the creative style he has been building over the years, like his use of colors, for example. Burton’s films are always marvelously colorful, whether he is using pastels, like he does here or in Edward Scissorhands, or dark hues, like in Batman, Dark Shadows or even Alice in Wonderland. His camera angles are another example of his skill. There is a little bit of Hitchcock, a little Wes Anderson, but a lot of just Tim Burton, his close-ups, his landscapes, his so very carefully crafted sets where there is so much movement, so much to see in each shot! The screen is truly a canvas for this director and there is never a wasted moment of film. It is still Tim Burton and Wes Anderson that keep American cinema in the forefront of creativity and give the audience so much more than just a story.

But even in the choice of the story we find Tim Burton’s style. Once again, as in Ed Wood, here is an artist with a rather obscure place in art history. Were Keane’s paintings art? Were Ed Wood’s films? Who defines what art is and how is it determined? What about popularity and art, "mass" art? All touched upon here, but this time Burton not only dives into the art of Margaret Keane and has his eyes on her soul, but he also impressively presents the dynamics of her relationship with Walter Keane, the husband that passed her art off as his and dominated her almost to the point of destruction.

Christoph Waltz and Amy Adams

The plot, then, is not just about Keane and her art, it is about a woman confined, dominated, as women were (and too many still are), trapped in a relationship that is slowly sucking the life out of her.  Burton is brilliant at capturing the feeling of suffocation, of despair that Keane suffers. With the talent of Christoph Waltz, who plays Walter Keane, we also witness the undoing of the domineering man; as women begin to take control of their lives, the men who dominate them also see their senseless world begin to crumble. We witness their ridiculousness, their smallness. The movie is a feminist statement in this way and more. For many women, it is a roller coaster of emotions and we are never removed from the characters on the screen.

I am surprised that many critics haven’t seen a lot of what I’m pointing out in a film that I consider one of the most complete films of the year. Again, maybe it is because a lot of movie critics are male, very mainstream and safe within their privilege. (The same ones that found Keanu Reave’s macho movie John Wick so compelling!) Burton’s humanity sheds so much of his male privilege and he is able to see into the soul of women dominated. Because he has looked into the world of the “outsider”, of those on the margins of society so many times in his films, he is able to takes us along as he looks into the souls of his characters, making us all the more humane in the process.

Director Tim Burton