The 66-year-old filmmaker and artist - whose credits include Edward Scissorhands, Beetlejuice, Mars Attacks!, Batman, and Alice Through The Looking Glass - finally received the tribute on Tuesday.

At the ceremony, Burton was joined by the stars of his latest movie Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, Michael Keaton and Winona Ryder, and his actor girlfriend Monica Bellucci, 59.

In a speech, Keaton, 72, recalled Burton taking a chance on him and casting him as the titular superhero in 1989's Batman, a role he went on to reprise in 1992's Batman Returns.

"He hands me a script and goes, 'Tell me what you think'," he said.

"This is after Beetlejuice. After that performance. After that type of movie. He says to the studio, 'I want that guy'. I'll never understand why anyone cared.

"The uproar ... you would've thought we were being invaded. It was unbelievable. The press was going crazy. But he stood by me. The guts it took to stand by that decision will always be appreciated by me."

The Jack Frost star - who plays the titular role in the two Beetlejuice movies - said Burton should be credited for making superhero movies so lucrative.

"What that (movie) spawned ... there are a lot of people making a lot of money out there with their superhero movies because of his choice and his vision of what those movies could be because he changed everything."

Despite his impact, Burton recently insisted he had no desire to make any more superhero films.

He told Variety: "At the moment, I would say no. I come at things from different points of view, so I would never say never to anything. But, at the moment, it's not something I'd be interested in."

Burton said making Batman in 1988 was a very different experience from the way most comic book films are made these days because the shoot felt "experimental".

Burton walked away from the Batman movies after making his 1992 sequel, and he admitted the tide was starting to turn while they were shooting the film.

"I got re-energised by the whole thing (when I returned for the sequel). And that was when we started hearing the word franchise and where the studio started going, 'What's the black stuff coming out of the Penguin's mouth?'

"It was the first time the cold wind of that kind of thing came upon me."

With AAP.