Tim

(This is my Vincent in honour of Tim Burton's 50th Birthday. Our entire neighbourhood of kids got together and created a short film to go with this. For all intents and purposes it is awful, yet it oozes with love and affection for Tim... It took us about one year to put it together, and shortly afterwards, this amazing band of kids started to move away. It remains an everlasting memory of many good times with the Moorside Kids. So thanks again to Tim Burton, for ALWAYS inspiring our creativity! I am in the process of getting permission from all those involved, before I post a copy, so I hope to share it soon!)

                           Tim

Tim Sweeney was a boy of eleven years
Who was warm and affectionate, sometimes driven to tears
By the images he saw in the movies he dug
By the passion he felt for creating, like a drug.

Cartoons and drawings, even funny little films
That made people laugh and brought him such thrills.
He was driven by his art and his love for the curtain,
But his greatest catalyst was the work of Tim Burton.

He died his hair black and fluffed it all fluffy
He craved the macabre and loved his black stuffy.
He dressed like a character created by Tim
He was also inspired by things that had been
Associated with Tim Burton's style
Tim's philosophy of living and drawings by the mile.
How he questions reality and paints all his feelings
How he surrounds himself with friends for all his creative dealings.

Tim Sweeney set himself up in much the same way
He had a regular group with whom he would play
The kids played together in the Sticky Woods
Used their imagination and ran like kids should.

Tim Sweeney was the leader, the director of them all
He'd contrive their scenarios and have a real ball
Sometimes it was Dracula, sometimes Robin Hood
No one created like Tim Sweeney could.

Like Tim Burton, Tim Sweeney didn't crave fame
He didn't hunger for money or that kind of game
He just wanted to make pictures of life as he saw it
To play with what's real, and our fear, and just show it.

He liked to think about death and its theories
And the fear that's related, the worries, the wearies.
The fact that people think it's so dark
When it happens to everyone from humans to larks.

Tim Sweeney loved to explore all that seemed dark and scary
And occasionally his mother would have a hairy canary.
"Can't you write about roses or tell stories about the prom?
Why do all of your images have to create such alarm?"
"Mom" he said and looked into her eyes
"There are cultures in which there are cries of joy and celebration when somebody dies
Why must you think DARK, SCARY and SAD?
I feel connected to these images, they make me feel glad
To be able to express these feelings inside
So please let me share them and don't make me hide."

So she helped him she did, Tim Sweeney and his mother
He worked on his art with a devotion like no other.
Sometimes it was dark and twisted and grungy
But other times warm, sentimental and funny.

Though his inspirations were many, that is for certain
He never lost his deep admiration for Tim Burton.
He continued to watch all his films and read books
That he knew had been drivers for Tim Burton's looks.

In his movies, his photos and child-like stories
Tim Sweeney, in spite of all this, still had worries.
He wanted to meet this director, his mentor
He wasn't one to be pushy, be forceful, break and enter.

So he scoured his brain for a way to connect
To let Burton know his incredible effect.
When he saw Vincent he knew he had his in
He created his own tribute and called it Tim.

Sally