Sleepy Hollow (1999) features Johnny Depp and Christina Ricci. It’s a retelling of the story of the Legend of Sleepy Hollow, written by Washington Irving. The music was done by Danny Elfman.
Ichabod Crane, played by Johnny Depp, appears to be a man trapped in time. He is a constable who conducts investigations using scientific means rather than torture to extract confessions from persons who are being charged. He’s been assigned the mission of tracking down the murderer in Sleepy Hollow, who kills his victims by slicing off their heads.
Christopher Walken plays the Horsemen and looks terrifying with his filed down pointed teeth.
Tim Burton’s style is evident throughout the film. From the movie’s outfit designs, scene design, and atmosphere. The film has the appearance and feel of being set in the past. However, the set design and clothing have a distinct Tim Burton flavor to them.
Tim Burton has indicated that his love of Hammer Horror films from the 1960s and 1970s affected the aesthetic and direction of Sleepy Hollow. He also got a few well-known Hammer Horror actors to star in the film, including Christopher Lee, who is best known for his portrayal of Dracula in the Hammer Horror Dracula films, and Michael Hough, who was best known for his portrayal of Dracula in the Hammer Horror Dracula films.
Michael Gough
Despite the fact that the film is over 20 years old, it nevertheless looks fresh and well-made. This is one of those Tim Burton films that you can watch again and over and still enjoy yourself.
Synopsis:
The curse of the headless horseman is the legacy of the small town of Sleepy Hollow. Spearheaded by the eager Constable Ichabod Crane and his new world ways into the swamp of secrets and murder, secrets once laid to rest, best forgotten and now re-awakened, and he too, holding a dark secret of a past once gone
12 Fun Facts about Tim Burton’s Sleepy Hollow
- Johnny Depp adopted the horse Goldeneye that played Gunpowder, Ichabod Crane’s horse in the film when he heard that it was going to be put down.
- It was only after being cast the headless horseman that Christopher Walken admitted to Tim Burton that he actually did not know to ride a horse.
- The cast and crew said that walking through the sets, especially Lime Tree, was almost as if you were walking through the mind of Tim Burton.
- Washington Irving claimed that Ichabod Crane and Katrina Van Tassel were real people.
Washington Irving
- Historically Ichabod Crane was a very unattractive man, Johnny Depp wanted to put on prosthetics to make himself more ugly, but Tim Burton wanted to base the character’s un-attractiveness more on his personality traits, his squeamishness and eccentricity.
- The small town of Sleepy Hollow was completely built with rooms, floor and stairs. The town was dismantled after filming had completed.
- In the novel Sleepy Hollow, the headless Horsemen lost his head from a cannon blast in a unknown battle in the American Revolutionary War.
- Sleepy Hollow and Bringing Out The Dead were the last movies to be released on the Laserdisc format, a precursor to DVD’s.
- Michael Gough came out of retirement to play Notary Hardenbrook.
- This is the first adaption of Sleepy Hollow that did not require the actor to conceal his head in the cloak, thanks to advancement in technology. The actor was covered in a blue mask that was deleted with CGI and the collar was recreated with CGI as well.
- Tim Burton says he envisioned Johnny Depp’s Ichabod Crane as the sort of character that Peter Cushing and Vincent Price used to regularly play in Hammer Horror films and the Edgar Allan Poe adaptations of Roger Corman.
- That the Western Wood was built on a sound stage, so everything including the weather and the light could be controlled.
