Edward is never really accepted for who he is by those around him, the persecution he is subjected to the result of a communal, warped worldview and individual biases, ranging from an overzealous religious neighbor spouting gospel to a towering bully prone to threats and violence. These are the faces of a “safe” community, one that is so deluded by panic and privilege that it is rendered blind, unable to see that irrational, deep-seated hatred is the problem, that the obstacle in need of overcoming is internal, not a man with scars.
* * *
A Gothic mansion stands on a hill above a sunny neighborhood of pastel houses and green lawns. It is the picture of outdated suburbia, where husbands leave for work in a succession of shiny cars while wives mostly stay at home, sharing gossip and flirting with dishwasher repairmen. The whole image is problematic but intentional, a clear commentary on 1950s-esque American culture.
Yet one woman, an Avon lady, is knocking on door after door, trying to sell makeup to her neighbors. Peg Boggs is determined but subtly downtrodden, evidenced by heavy sighs and a staged, cheery veneer. While her peers seem content and bourgeois, there is a subtle rawness to Peg, a hint of sadness and disappointment. After another failed sale, she gets into her car, adjusts her rearview mirror and sees, perfectly framed, that dark mansion on the hill. Even from a distance, it is foreboding. Peg has never been there before, but today is the day she’s going.
So begins Tim Burton’s Edward Scissorhands. The film is well known, having attained cult classic status since its release in 1990. It is a personal favorite of mine, one that has stood the test of time, and I watch it at least once every year.
Of course, the premise is unusual. Edward, a constructed, not-quite man, built by an eccentric inventor who died before his work could be finished, is complete except for his hands, which have remained sharp and sizable scissors. Ever since his creator’s death, he has been alone.
That is, until Peg comes to visit. After dipping below cobwebs and navigating staircases in search of a potential client, she discovers Edward. Understandably, she is disturbed by how he lives (in squalor, separate from all human contact). When Edward first approaches from a dark corner, scissors glinting in the sunlight, she is horrified. It takes only a moment, though, to understand that he is not holding a weapon. Then he speaks – and speaks well – gently telling her not to go. Immediately, our bleeding-heart Peg gets it: he is all by himself. It is no way to live. She tells Edward, “I think you should just come home with me.” She nods. Smiles. It is decided.
Edward becomes an additional member of the Boggs’ family. Bill, Peg’s husband, seems intent on turning him into a respected and responsible citizen, a self-sufficient go-getter with career prospects. He is quick to offer wisdom, despite the fact that Edward is an exceptional case. Every facet of his life will be all the more challenging, and Bill’s pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps-logic illustrates his lack of awareness. Their son, Kevin, is more taken by Edward’s foreignness, begging to take him to show-and-tell at school. Peg is dedicated to creating a nurturing environment for Edward, one where she herself can dote on and lend him emotional support. She does everything from cover up his self-inflicted cuts with concealer to tuck him into bed to compliment his lettuce-chopping technique for a salad. Edward accepts all of this, his appreciation palpable. This gives Peg, who is shrugged off by her own children, a much-needed sense of purpose. Still, there is a distance. She cannot protect him from everything.
Kim, the daughter, initially responds coldly to Edward, uncomfortable with his intrusion. Late one night, she gets the fright of her life when she comes home from a camping trip to find Edward in her waterbed. After all is explained, Kim remains guarded, embarrassed by him and pitying all at once.
What follows is Edward’s immersion into a white, middle-class community. Nearly everyone takes an active, suffocating interest at first, buzzing over his novelty. It doesn’t last. After a series of misunderstandings and deceptions from those around him, the neighborhood’s attitude toward Edward shifts. He is manipulated into helping Kim’s boyfriend break into his own parents’ house and is abandoned when the alarm system goes off, resulting in a trip to the police station. It is obvious that he is desperately trying to navigate this new way of life and the complex and often contradictory nature of people, but innocence makes him an easy target. When another neighbor comes on to Edward, he flees, legitimately afraid and confused over her actions. She responds by accusing him of attempted rape. Tensions continue to mount until Edward is forced to run away, back to where he came from.
I could say this movie is beloved and familiar, which would be true but not enough. Have you ever heard a line of dialogue, one that feels delicately plucked from your jumbled brain and given a coherent voice? Finally, someone feels the way you feel. For a blazing moment, you are less alone. The whole of Edward Scissorhands feels that way to me. It is hard to explain in simple terms, but has something to do with detachment, with a permeating rootlessness and lack of belonging. It is difficult for me to feel at home in my environment. Connecting with people has always been a challenge. Making sense of the world around me seems impossible most of the time. If you are nodding along, there is plenty to cling to in Edward Scissorhands.
Attempting to communicate my feelings about the film in the past, I’ve erupted into a string of choked clichés: the subtle beauty of the story, how Edward is too pure for society. Here he is, a manufactured outsider – an other – yet Edward’s evolution in the film culminates in his ability to feel, more than the people around him, love – and to have that love returned. Indeed, he is more human than the lot of them.
But I was struck by something else this year, something more than creative brilliance and emotional resonance. It is horrific to witness the town’s perception of Edward evolve from curiosity to resentment to unwarranted fear. He goes from charity case to strange/useful/lovable pseudo-resident to assumed criminal in the eyes of his newfound community so quickly it is ferocious. Even Peg pivots, deciding that it would be best for Edward to leave, though it is clear that she sincerely believes it would be better for him, that his removal is tantamount to his safety. The angry villagers armed with their fire and pitchforks are on the way.
Peg seems heartbroken and frustrated and tired – tired of the challenge of attempting to place someone “different” into a “normal” environment. The inherent judgment and insidiousness of Edward’s treatment has always been apparent to me in past viewings, but this time it was visceral and felt closer than ever. Such mistreatment is more than an unfortunate progression. It is the true pulse of the film, the epicenter of the conflict—and all too believable.
There has been a spike in white supremacy, the American president himself the glorified leader of the pack. Families are being separated at the border and drowning in the sea. Watching Edward Scissorhands in 2020, I felt a renewed relevance, an urgent reminder that this knee-jerk distrust of the other is timeless, as is our condemnation of anyone we deem below or different from us.
Edward’s hands are a defining characteristic. Plop him anywhere and he would stand out. It is this difference that makes him the perfect embodiment of otherness. His hands – a stand-in for skin color or gender or language or sexuality or, as one well-intentioned but ignorant neighbor puts it, “disability” – are, metaphorically, a solid symbol for the attack on individuality, no matter what – or how troublesome and erroneous – the perceived difference is. But who is anyone to say what, or who, is normal? Who gets to decide what is accepted, or safe? The neighborhood’s labeling of him is not simply reductive, it’s dangerous.
Maybe the message of Edward Scissorhands is obvious and elementary: Compassion is crucial. But another nuanced, important focal point of the movie centers on our nostalgic feelings about the 1950s. While it is never explicitly stated that this film is set in the ’50s, it feels specific to that time, from the way the characters dress to the food they eat to the mid-century modern buildings dotting their corner of the world. We look back fondly as if it were a mini-Renaissance, full of discovery and excitement and innovation. The reality was quite different. The national mood was one of terror and paranoia, with visions of bomb blasts and Soviet takeover reverberating in America’s collective head. Even in 1990, when the film was released, the complex sentimentality was there. It still exists today. The point? Our past is not rosy, nor is it simple. We like to believe we have evolved, that we are more open-minded and accepting than ever, and yet there is still a separatist, not-in-my-backyard mentality, and we need only turn on the television or search the internet to feel its heat. As far as we think we have come, we have a long way to go. We live in a culture of suspicion, and all too often we search for a scapegoat and aim our animosity at those who don’t deserve it.
Perhaps the case I am making has been made already, as hatred has existed as long as there has been human history, and the most vulnerable have always suffered. That is, after all, one of the film’s presiding messages.
Or perhaps, when a movie proves lasting, it has the capacity to grow and change, year to year, and find new footing. Maybe, even, the message itself can shift to speak for what afflicts us here and now. In a time when we are increasingly divided and fear is being used to fan the flames, our compassion is and will be required and tested. I am thankful for a film like Edward Scissorhands because it does more than call for compassion in the way that many highly regarded and “serious” movies (usually showered with trophies come Oscar season) do. Its point goes further, well beyond a base-level amount of tolerance and kindness. It is not enough, the film says. Obviously. Our apathy runs too deep.
Edward is never really accepted for who he is by those around him, the persecution he is subjected to the result of a communal, warped worldview and individual biases, ranging from an overzealous religious neighbor spouting gospel to a towering bully prone to threats and violence. These are the faces of a “safe” community, one that is so deluded by panic and privilege that it is rendered blind, unable to see that irrational, deep-seated hatred is the problem, that the obstacle in need of overcoming is internal, not a man with scars.
In the final act, Edward, out of time and options, escapes with Kim’s help. She has changed over the course of the film, becoming the only person who fully understands him, his goodness, and, alternatively, the madness of the world around her.
Edward’s escape strikes me as painfully tragic for the simple reason that it doesn’t have to be this way. The film could have had a cozy, quirky ending that worked, the kind of macabre fable Burton is known for, where specificity and plausibility might not matter as much as his trademark heartfelt absurdity that is simultaneously convincing and fitting. But an easy, happy ending would not be right. More than that, it wouldn’t be realistic. It’s funny to cite realism when spotlighting a movie whose central character has scissors for hands, but there it is. The conclusion as it stands, with Edward running back to his lonely, derelict mansion, away from a world that has largely villainized and turned its back on him, is the only worthy ending. The inevitability of it all is what makes Edward Scissorhands powerful. When people are afraid, they forget how to take care of each other.
While the rampant prejudice in the film saddens and enrages me, what I find profoundly moving is the bond between Edward and Kim when all is said and done. I think back to Edward’s first glimpse of Kim, in a photograph in the Boggs’ living room. The way he looks at her is touching in its intensity, his expression a mix of tenderness and wonder. I think of Kim dancing under an ice sculpture Edward has made in her image. I think of their rushed goodbye, Kim whispering “I love you” and meaning it, and how Edward closes his eyes, the force of her feelings enough, leaving the viewer with the understanding that he is forever changed and will survive precisely because of her enduring words.
But we do not end on Edward’s or even Kim’s departure. The movie actually ends years in the future, Kim herself a grandmother, telling her granddaughter a story about a man who had scissors for hands. She knows he is still up on the hill because of snow. Before he came down to their town, it never snowed. After he left, it did. He is working up there. Carving ice. Remembering. So, too, is Kim. “Sometimes,” she says, referencing the flurries outside her window, “you can still catch me dancing in it.”
Love goes a long way.
* * *
All images are screenshots from the film’s trailers or DVD.
