Edward Scissorhands: No 21 best sci-fi and fantasy film of all time

It's fitting that a movie about a gothic robot with knives for fingers should be director Tim Burton's most personal film. It's also the first of the director's long-running and highly successful pairings with Johnny Depp. Here Burton puts his star in white makeup, a shock wig of hair and a costume that seems to be comprised entirely of straps and buckles. Then he gives this shy, kind and awkward creature scissors for hands, and plonks him into the middle of a pastel suburbia. It's an obvious metaphor for those difficult teenage years but a powerful and hugely effective one nonetheless. Burton pulls inspiration from Chuck Jones cartoons as well as classic horror films; in this world, it's the freak, the outsider who is the hero, and the conventional world that is not to be trusted. There's real emotion and sweetness with a moving, bittersweet romance between Edward and Kim (Winona Ryder). As fun as Burton's other films are to watch, this is the one with the heart to match the eye.