Danny Elfman's Horror Film Music Elements in the Films by Tim Burton
Summary
Horror film music is a side of film music that has not been researched that often. Especially not in combination with the specific styles of Tim Burton and Danny Elfman. Films of Tim Burton are often thought to be frightening, but they turn out not to be. There often are references in the films to horror, but how is this done in the music? This thesis answers the question: To what extent does the music of Danny Elfman in films by Tim Burton express fright? The focus of this thesis has been on two very different Tim Burton films, namely Beetlejuice (1988) and Sleepy Hollow (1999). The “Main Titles” of these films have been analysed and compared to elements in horror film music that are thought to express fright. These elements have been deduced from literature by authors like Isabella van Elferen and Joe Tompkins. The elements range from instrumentation to harmonics and dynamics to scare tactics. Where Sleepy Hollow is the more frightening film of the two, this thesis has shown that in both films the music of Danny Elfman features a lot of horror film music elements and thus expresses fright. Even though both films feature about the same amount of horror film music elements, as expected when having seen both films, the music of Sleepy Hollow does have a more frightening character than the music of Beetlejuice.