Follow the camera through the tree hole, welcome to the wonderful world created by Tim Burton.
Setting
has a strong contrast between the two main scenes in the film. In Halloween City, we can see the settings of the Gothic culture that Tim likes: strange castles, black cemeteries, and strange pumpkin lanterns. Here, most of the buildings are stone, without plants and sunlight, and are very desolate. . The background color is basically a dark single tone, such as the sky of Halloween City. The director always makes the sky seem to be covered by thick dark gray clouds, giving people a very heavy and depressed feeling. Even in the early morning, the whole city is dark yellow.
In sharp contrast is Christmas City, which is a very dreamy place with exquisite houses and brilliant neon lights. Very warm atmosphere. The most obvious is that during the preparations for Christmas, the director made multiple transitions between the two scenes to achieve a strong contrast effect. It makes Halloween become even more weird, and Christmas becomes even more dreamy. The director likes to use extreme brightness and extreme darkness as a contrast in the film. Give the audience a great visual impact. As if in a fairy tale. At the end of the film, when Santa Claus walks through the Halloween city, it brings heavy snow, and it also sweeps away the monotony and coldness of the Halloween city to set off the final happy reunion.
In terms of space arrangement, because there are many individual monologues, the director usually arranges the role in the middle of the item to attract the attention of the audience. For example, when Jack or Sally is making a monologue, their position is always in the middle of the screen, and there are not too many background objects, which is very eye-catching. Even when Jack was monologue under the moon, the director did not arrange any background, but just a bright moon. This bright blank background focused the audience's attention on Jack's facial expressions.
Another very special scene is when Santa Claus is in the villain's territory. Different from the single dim tone of the entire Halloween city, the director used computer technology to make the colors in this room very bright and bright, suggesting a dangerous and toxic environment for the audience.
The director is also good at using various props to set off the atmosphere of the film. When Jack left, the smoke Sally placed did not achieve the purpose of stopping Jack. However, this smoke became a very important prop in the later Sally monologue. It blurs the background and focuses the audience's attention on Sally. It creates a very hazy feeling, and at the same time reflects the confusion in Sally's heart, not knowing what to do. The costumes in the
Costume & makeup
film are carefully designed according to the characteristics of the characters. For example, the protagonist Jack's dress is a scarecrow in a black tuxedo with a skull head, which can show his horror effect and conforms to the very gentleman and sentimental characteristics of his personality. And his costume also hints at the development of the plot. When he was whimsical about giving Christmas presents to the children, he put on a bright Santa suit made by Sally, which didn't match his image. And when he was knocked down by a cannon, his Santa Claus suit became tattered, suggesting that his dream was shattered. Finally, when Jack tore off the Santa Claus suit and restored his original tuxedo, it implied that Jack was awake from the fantasy, cheered up from the loss, and refreshed to do his own job.
The costumes of other characters are also very distinctive. The clothes of the people in the Halloween costumes are all weird, weird, and terrifying. For example, the black cloak of the vampire, the clothes of the monsters are basically tattered, the peaked hat worn by the witch, and the many ugly little ghosts, but the strangeness is funny and cute, such as the mayor in a serious suit. At the same time, she is wearing a funny top hat and will be decorated with flowers during the festival. Set off the fairy tale atmosphere.
Lighting
does not have a special light source on the screen, but diverges evenly to every corner. This soft light also adds a vague and hazy feeling to the image, creating a dreamy and unreal feeling, and enhancing the film’s fairy tale atmosphere.
In the Halloween city in the Czech Republic, there is almost no sunlight. The director basically uses dim light as the background, and uses more side light to only hit the head or body of the character to show the outline of the character and match the dark atmosphere. . The director also used other lights to achieve different effects. For example, the most obvious is the backlight against the moon, which only shows the outline of the human body to highlight the exaggerated movements of the character. And the use of red or yellow background light can achieve a good horror effect.
There are also many uses of shadows in the film. To make the characters more three-dimensional. For example, when Jack is giving a speech, the director often uses shadow to represent a person. For example, before the official appearance of the contra-angle bookie, every time he appears, there is only a shadow. This makes it more horrible and also makes it more horrible. The audience's imagination makes it very mysterious. More shadows appear, such as the characters in the house made at Christmas. As well as the old people who were frightened by the scary gift, the use of shadows makes these characters not overwhelming and saves energy.
Staging is an
animation created by single-frame shooting. Tim likes to choose this traditional way of making animations. After ten years, he used the same technique to make the zombie bride, which is also very popular. This way is very realistic, as if it is really in a fairy tale. Although it is shot by frame, the characters' facial expressions are rich and delicate, and their movements are smooth. This requires a large number of models, for example, there are more than 400 head models for the protagonist Jack alone. In fact, Jack's head is not too complicated. There are only two big eye holes and a mouth, but the director creates very expressive facial expressions by using different shapes of glasses and mouth. Because the characters in the animation are fictitious, the director used his imagination to the extreme to create an illusory and strange world, such as the mayor’s two faces and Sally’s detachable body—this also helped her rescue Christmas later. The old man made the bedding, and Doctor Strange's head can be opened at any time to tickle the brain, so that every character in the movie is full and full, highlighting the weird and weird atmosphere of Halloween City.
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