The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

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Dusty: [imagining millions of subscribers] Just because I cannot see it, doesn’t mean I can’t believe it!

Rating: PG
Director: Henry Selick
Writers: Tim Burton, Michael McDowell, Caroline Thompson
Stars: Danny Elfman, Chris Sarandon, Catherine O’Hara
Release Date: October 29, 1993
Run time: 1 hour, 16 minutes

THE PLOT:

via wiki:

Halloween Town is a fantasy world populated by various monsters and supernatural beings associated with the eponymous holiday. Jack Skellington, the well-respected Pumpkin King, leads the town in organizing its annual celebrations. However, Jack is weary of the same routine and longs for something new. Upon discovering trees containing doors to other holiday-themed worlds, Jack stumbles through the one leading to Christmas Town and is fascinated by the unfamiliar holiday.

Jack returns home and shares his discovery with his friends and neighbors, but they struggle to grasp the concept of Christmas, although they relate to its ruler, Santa Claus, or “Sandy Claws” as Jack mistakenly dubs him. After several futile attempts to rationally explain Christmas, Jack decides to “improve” the holiday instead. He announces that Halloween Town will take over Christmas this year and assigns Christmas-themed jobs to various residents, such as singing carols, making presents, and building a sleigh pulled by skeletal reindeer.

Sally, the feminine creation of local mad scientist Doctor Finkelstein, experiences a vision predicting that their efforts will end disastrously. Jack, whom she secretly loves, dismisses her warnings and instructs her to make a Santa Claus suit for him. He tasks mischievous trick-or-treating trio Lock, Shock, and Barrel with abducting Santa; however, he orders them not to involve their superior Oogie Boogie, a bogeyman with a passion for gambling and Jack’s long-time rival, in their plot.

When Lock, Shock, and Barrel bring Santa to Halloweentown, Jack tells him that he will take care of Christmas this year and orders the trio to keep Santa safe. However, they disobey Jack’s orders and bring Santa to Oogie Boogie, who plots to play a game with Santa’s life at stake. As Jack departs to deliver presents in the real world, Sally, after failing to stop him beforehand, attempts to rescue Santa from Oogie, only to be captured herself.

Jack’s Halloween-themed presents terrify the real world’s populace, who contact the local authorities and are instructed to lock down their homes for protection. The military is alerted and Jack is shot out of the sky, leading Halloween Town to believe he is dead. It is revealed that he survived and has crashed into a nearby cemetery. Bemoaning the trouble that he has caused, Jack realizes he nonetheless enjoyed the experience and that it gave him new ideas for celebrating next Halloween, reigniting his love for the holiday.

Upon returning home, Jack saves Santa and Sally, confronts Oogie Boogie, and defeats him by unraveling a thread holding his cloth form together, causing all of the insects inside Oogie to spill out and reduce him to nothing. Though displeased with Jack for his foolish actions and not listening to Sally earlier, Santa makes amends with him and resumes his yearly duties, replacing Jack’s presents with genuine ones and saving Christmas.

All of Halloween Town celebrates Jack’s return. Santa brings a snowfall to the town, thereby bringing the Christmas spirit upon it, while Jack and Sally finally declare their love for each other.

My Review

The Nightmare Before Christmas is a visually magnificent piece of art. The stop motion animated film, brought to life by director Henry Selick, created an other-worldly environment that felt like a glimpse inside of Tim Burton’s mind. Beyond the visual charm, though, and I suspect this is an unpopular opinion, I did not really enjoy much of the rest of what the movie had to offer. I found myself relatively bored with the story and with the musical delivery thereof.

Jack , the King of Halloween Town, has grown bored of his repetitive life of frights, and then finds out about the existence of Christmas Town. He decides in a non-malicious way that he wants to take it over. His efforts fail, but they failed early enough that it left time for the real Santa Claus to set things right. In the end, the skeleton man seems to end up with a girlfriend (a Frankenstein’s monster who shares Jack’s curiosity, though with what seems to be a bit more rationality.) I’m not sure I really understood the lesson of Jack’s literal and emotional journey. “Don’t get too far out of your lane?” “Maybe that unfulfilled longing in your life is for the girl next door, not in the town next over?” “Halloween shaped pegs don’t fit into Christmas shaped holes?”

I think the story might have hooked me if the music were a bit more memorable. None of it was bad, but none of it is particularly great, either. The movie came out in 1993 and I did not know or remember any of the songs. If there had been a bit more magic in the melodies, perhaps I could have done a better job of letting go and immersing myself more fully in the visually incredible environment.

I watched this with an eye toward whether I thought kids might enjoy it, and I think the visual are such that they might. The short run time is a big help. I don’t know how well the spooky humor will land with children, though I think the bar for them is probably lower and more fair than my own bar. The kids watching this movie with me, in my imagination, commented that it was weird. (Is it weird to have the ability to watch movies with imaginary people and gather their commentary?) There wasn’t anything in the film that seemed like it would be too much for a kid of just about any age to see and absorb. I’d guess that you could feel really safe letting anyone about 7 and up watch the movie. If you need to talk to a child about this movie, on any point, it’s probably regarding the fact that the female lead repeatedly “poisons” her creator so that she can get out of the house and explore what the world has to offer. He just sleeps and wakes up to find her gone. but I suppose you don’t want kids getting the idea to put things in anyone’s drinks.

On the whole, I am glad I watched this. As an appreciator of art, I really enjoyed how Selick brought Burton’s vision to life. Stop motion animation is very visually holiday-coded and The Nightmare is done particularly well. That said, I did get a bit bored after a while. Perhaps a lifetime of being exposed to Tim Burton removed some of the magic that I might have felt were this my maiden voyage into his movies. As I mentioned before, I also think the music could have been quite a bit better.

Nevertheless, I think I’m much more in the mood for Halloween after watching the movie than I had been before. That’s something.

Have you seen The Nightmare Before Christmas? If so, what did you think?