Big Eyes Review

Big Eyes is a film which is directed by Tim Burton and follows the true story of the artist Margaret Keane who is famous for creating paintings with characters that have big eyes. But there’s one problem though, her husband, Walter Keane, is taking credit for all her work and claims he painted them all. Big Eyes stars Amy Adams, Christoph Waltz, Krysten Ritter, Jason Schwartzman and Terence Stamp.

Big Eyes Trailer

Big Eyes is an interesting film and the story is fascinating. I had kind of known about these painting as I had see them somewhere before, but I had no idea who Margaret Keane was or the story behind them, or even who painted these paintings with the big eyes, so the film was an interesting one to see and learn from.

What’s happening in Big Eyes is that Margaret who is being played by Amy Adams is an artist who paints these paintings with characters that have big eyes. But Margaret has no flair for marketing or sales and struggles to sell her own work to the people she meets. One day she encounters Walter Keane who is another struggling artist. The two form a relationship and eventually marry. Walter is a master at marketing and sales and starts selling these paintings and makes a lot of money. But Walter doesn’t have any ethics, he claims he painted them himself and gains a lot of fame for work that was not his, but Margaret’s. Margaret is forced by her husband to keep this secret and continue to paint more “Big Eyes” for him to sell and it puts a lot of stress onto her, knowing that no one knows her for her work.

The performances in the film are all wonderful. Amy Adams really did well with her role as Margaret Keane and I think the Golden Globe award she received for her performance here was well deserved. Christoph Waltz also did a superb job as Walter Keane and had many entertaining moments. There was a scene where Walter was trying to sell paintings to people who were going into the bathroom and it is quite funny to see. Both actors got a good mix of dramatic and comedic scenes to. Krysten Ritter and Jason Schwartzman both were entertaining in their scenes and Terrence Stamp was good in his role as the mean art critic.

One of the things I really enjoyed from Big Eyes was the directing from Tim Burton. I think it’s a bit of a different kind of movie than the usual Tim Burton films, but you do see his touch here and there. I really liked when characters during some of the crazier moments of the film appeared to have big eyes themselves, or even when Margaret was looking at herself in the mirror. They were kind of subtle but right there the whole time and it just helped keep the film entertaining and interesting. The movie in some parts is also genuinely funny and other times kind of sad as well and there is a good balance throughout between the two.

As a true story that I don’t really know much about, I can’t really be sure at the moment about how close this film was to the actual real life events. However as film on its own I really enjoyed watching Big Eyes. The performances were all excellent the characterisation was well presented. There are certain times when you are watching Walter Keane (Christoph Waltz) talk and you know he’s just making it all up and you kind of feel like why doesn’t anyone slap the man into some sense and it’s great!

Big Eyes also has a really great soundtrack with many great songs in in the film and if you’re just wanting to listen to it at home, you do get a few good songs. The Big Eyes soundtrack features some songs from Lana Del Rey so if you’re a fan of her music you will likely enjoy it in the film as it features throughout. Tim Burton films always seem to have some great sounding soundtracks, I’ve not really known any that haven’t, he just seems to always find the right people for each one.

Overall I really enjoyed watching Big Eyes and I really loved the performances from both Amy Adams and Christoph Waltz, they were both great. I also really liked the directing from Tim Burton who seemed to find a way to make everyone’s eyes in the film stand out in a big way and his balancing of changing tones from funny to sad was well done. Big Eyes has an interesting story that I think people can learn from after watching it. It provides a lot of insight into the art world and the importance of receiving credit or taking credit for one’s work and what that can do to someone and the story of Margaret Keane is a great example of that.