Frankenweenie

    This is a movie I've been waiting about three years for. Whenever I first found out about it, it was pretty unbelievable. I didn't think Disney would green light a remake of the short film that they once rejected for being too scary. I believe after seeing the continuous popularity of The Nightmare Before Christmas that will never go away, they decided to take a risk. I was getting pretty excited for it as years went on and was glad it got a lot of advertising unlike most stop motion films. Did it dissappoint?
   For waiting so long for Frankenweenie, it was satisfying. Was it better than NBC? Course not.Was it better than Corpse Bride and James and the Giant Peach? Yes. Was it better than ParaNorman? Well I think it is fair to say they are both equal, except Frankenweenie had more flaws. It is funny how they are pretty much the same plot wise. Lead boy character with no friends and ridiculed for being different by his parents get in an incident where the dead are reanimated, cause havoc and some other kids get involved and save the day. The only difference is they have different homages, one being 50's horror and sci fi movies and the other 70's and 80's underground zombie movies.
   In comparison with the original short, it was pretty respectful. Some parts were pretty exact. Obviously more things were added to make it into an actual full length film and that was completely fine because it wasn't horrible stuff. Comparing the short to the feature is like comparing Tim Burton's career then and now. The short is like something a beginning film maker would create and not much is to be expected. It was good for the concept and what it was. Fast forward about 25 years and of course there's is going to be more things added that turned out for the better. The beauty of this film is the creativity and the homages. There was homages for Frankenstein of course, The Mummy, Gamera, Creature of the Black Lagoon, and a touch of Gremlins. They even show a random clip from one of the Hammer Dracula films. Which was funny because I thought this took place in the 50's but those movies came out around the 60's and 70's. They must of thought not much people recognize Christopher Lee as Dracula.
The flaws I mentioned are very minor, it wasn't anything that ruined the movie. One thing is that it does suffer from "Why? cuz". The animals were brought back to life just because. It sounds random, but I wish a little more effort was made to show how besides being struck my magic lightening do they make the animals alive. It was an instance you have to put yourself in a unrealistic setting to enjoy it, and that I did.
The animation itself was good, but not as great as it could have. There wasn't too much special effects like previous stop motion films that were that grand. Some of the motions of the characters didn't have a flowing movement like in ParaNorman. The most awkward motion was when the characters were running. It felt like a frame or two was missing when that happened. It also was a bit distracting nearly all the characters looked the same. Although that is the style of Burton, the ones in Corpse Bride varied in design. When they stood in a crowd, it was hard to tell who was who. I wish they went for the approach in ParaNorman where the character design reflected on their personalities and looked very much like a caricature. The saving grace for it was the lighting. The shadows off the characters looked amazing and gave a very sinister look to some.
In all, this was a very good movie. It was funny, emotional, creative and a lot of fun. I really hope Burton takes his own characters and stories for more movies, rather than taking others. He is very talented when it comes to creating a new story with a dark twist. I recommend seeing this side by side with ParaNorman when time permits!

see you in 3 years stop motion....i love you.