Finding wonder in the macabre

Eva Green is a master of misfits in Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. CHINA DAILY

Something of a young-adult version of X-Men, the 127-minute film centers on a teenager who stumbles upon a group of children possessing paranormal abilities on a Welsh island in 1943. The boy helps his new friends to fight against eyeball-eating demons.

Again relying on his extraordinary imagination, Burton visualizes the fantastic settings in the novel on the big screen.

In a trailer tailored for the Chinese market, viewers can watch Miss Peregrine, the title role who protects the children from monster-eating demons, transform into a bird; a teenager lighter than air float on top of a tree; and a young girl eat chicken using teeth in the back of her head.

Miss Peregrine has dark moments. Jake, the teenage protagonist, sees his grandfather murdered with his eye sockets emptied. Monsters hunt down "extraordinary" people for their eyeballs.

But Burton believes such moments, with a blend of humor and emotion, still appeal to kids.