10 Films That Embellished Who Actually Made Them

Who You Probably Thought Made It: Tim Burton

Who Really Made It: Henry Selick

Commonly dubbed ‘Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas’, it’s no wonder there’s some confusion over who actually directed the creepy animated classic.

Though Burton acted as producer and came up with the story and characters behind the film (basing it on a three-page poem he’d penned in the early 80s), it was master of stop-motion Henry Selick that directed it and was majorly responsible for how the movie turned out.

In fact, Selick has claimed that Burton spent as little as ten days on set over the course of the movie’s two-year production – a far less hands-on role than one would assume. At the time, however, it made perfect marketing sense to over-emphasise Burton’s role who’d just directed several very successful films including Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands.

Nevertheless, the focus on Burton understandably irritated Selick who stated in an interview with The Daily Beast in 2013: “I was shoved pretty far in the background, which threw me, but it was probably a good marketing decision.”

Canny marketing move or not, the Tim Burton association has continued to dog Selick’s career as we shall soon see.