Frankenweenie

Movie Name: Frankenweenie
Year of Release: 2012

Director: Tim Burton

Stars: Catherine O'Hara, Martin Short, Martin Landau, Winona Ryder, Charlie Tahan, Atticus Shaffer, Christopher Lee, Conchata Ferrell, Robert Capron

Genre: Comedy, Animation, Horror

Score out of ten (whole numbers only): 9

Synopsis:

Tim Burton's "Frankenweenie" is a beautifully realized version of a short feature the director worked on at the beginning of his career at Disney. The film follows the story of young Victor Frankenstein, who is a lonely young boy, whose best friend is Sparky, his lively little dog. In one unfortunate accident, Sparky gets killed, and Victor unable to deal with his loss, decides to bring him back to life. This seemingly small event, starts going around Victor's young school colleagues, who in a bid to win the science fair unleash all sorts of monsters around town.
Tim Burton is a director with a very unique universe. As usual his main characters are part of the social tissue of a community, but always move in the fringes of it. His young hero, Victor, again comes in the vein of Edward Scissorhands, Ed Wood and even Willy Wonka - characters who are idiosyncratic and conduct their lives in a manner that though consistent with themselves, still sets them apart from everyone else. "Frankenweenie" has all of this and all the traditional trademarks from Tim Burton: the love of classic horror films, the eerie taste of suburbia, the quirky supporting characters, all designed fantastically well, with a beautiful cinematography from Peter Sorg and music from Danny Elfman. This is a great work from a director who keeps developing his universe and giving us films that have heart, intelligence and humor. A very good film worth watching.