Edward Scissorhands - Film review

Tim Burton's Edward Scissorhands (1990) is a dark fantasy film about love and how society treats those who are different to the mass.

Fig.1

The story revolves around a young man called Edward (Johnny Depp) who was created by an inventor (Vincent Price) but left unfinished when the inventor died, leaving him with scissors for hands and alone in a large mansion.
He is found by a kind woman, Peg Boggs (Dianne Wiest), who insists that he come live with her and her family in a normal suburban neighborhood.

Fig.2

The neighbors are strangely fine with Edward and his scissor hands, they accept him readily and become even more infatuated with him as his natural talents show. "One problem is that the other people are as weird, in their ways, as he is: Everyone in this film is stylized and peculiar" (Ebert, 1990)
But the moment Edward is arrested they all turn their backs on him, leading to the ending being a mob baying for his blood.

Fig.3

Edward Scissorhands is based around Burton's own feelings of isolation growing up, but it also seems to show the social stigma around people with learning disabilities. "Burton's modern fairytale has an almost palpably personal feel: it is told gently, subtly and with infinite sympathy for an outsider who charms the locals but then inadvertently arouses their baser instincts." (Lee, 2014)

Edward is naive and easily led astray with the right words, and also is shown to have difficulty in understanding figurative speech, which means his actions are less calculated than others will be, and he takes the fall for something that he didn't fully realize the consequences of, but the only person who appears to take any of this into consideration is the police officer who arrested him and shows concern for Edward's mental health and in the end attempts to placate the neighbors hatred with the implication that he had killed Edward, even though he had allowed Edward to run away back to his mansion.

Fig.4

The surroundings of the film are beautiful, with the Gothic castle overshadowing the 1980's suburb, and the clothing and hairstyles too, but the film's writing falls into a bit of an out of character seeming cliche for an ending. ""Edward Scissorhands" also reveals Burton's willingness to occasionally dip into his barrel of cliche's in order to finish a story. " (Propes)



Bibliography:
Images:
Figure 1, Poster (1990) [poster] At: http://cafmp.com/17741/edward-scissorhands-2/
Figure 2, Film still (1990) [film still] At: http://www.anothermag.com/art-photography/8102/ten-things-you-might-not-know-about-edward-scissorhands
Figure 3, Film still (1990) [film still] At: http://scathingly-brilliant.blogspot.co.uk/2011/03/style-idol-ladies-of-edward.html
Figure 4, Film still (1990) [film still] At: http://www.dkf.pwr.wroc.pl/terminy-projekcji-1/rok-2014/
Quotes:
Ebert, R. (1990) At: https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/edward-scissorhands-1990 (Accessed on 7 November 2017)
Lee, M. (2014) At: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/filmreviews/11298442/Edward-Scissorhands-review-a-true-fairytale.html (Accessed on 7 November 2017)
Propes, R. (s.d) At: http://theindependentcritic.com/edward_scissorhands (Accessed on 7 November 2017)