Due to the nature of the holiday, Tim Burton is going to be featured here quite a few times. The first of these, at the request of my mother (happy birthday, Mom!), is Beetlejuice.

It’s funny, I know I watched Beetlejuice as a child, but my earliest memories of it only date to the age of fourteen or fifteen. We’re a family of movie quoters, and Beetlejuice quotes were among the more common. Plenty of “I, myself, am strange and unusual,” or “This thing reads like stereo instructions,” or of course, “We’ve come for your daughter, Chuck.” But it wasn’t until after film school that I realized how much of a visual influence the movie had on my personal aesthetic sensibilities. Tim Burton plays with color in such an odd way. He’s very conventional with his color choices, but everything’s just a little bit oversaturated, lending a surreal air to what might otherwise be an entirely normal scene. Definitely a huge influence on me in that respect. And also the heavy heavy use of black.

Story-wise, Beetlejuice isn’t exactly the most sophisticated movie ever. There are some pieces that don’t quite make sense. There are a few poor transitions – for instance, how do the Maitlands have so much trouble saying his name until the exact moment they need him, and then can say it no problem? Little things like that that don’t add up properly. But it’s not necessarily meant to be sophisticated. It’s just a fun story about an unconventional family, which is something I can get behind.