Saturday, November 9, 2013

Movie Review: "The Nightmare Before Christmas" (1993)

Image Source
Movie: "The Nightmare Before Christmas"
Director: Henry Selick
Year: 1993
Rating: PG
Running Time: 1 hour, 16 minutes

The Pumpkin King Jack Skellington (Chris Sarandon) rules Halloweentown and is in charge of bringing the spirit of Halloween to the world. Lately, has become disillusioned by his job and wonders if there is more in the world for him. After an all-night walk in the woods, Jack comes across a circle of doors with different holiday icons on them. He opens the door with a Christmas tree and is transported to Christmastown. After seeing the wonderment of snow, pies, happy children, lights, and general Christmas cheer, Jack has decided that he will return to Halloweentown and that they will take over Santa's job to bring Christmas to the world this year.

BigJ and I have a tradition: every year on November 1st, the day after Halloween, we watch "The Nightmare Before Christmas" as our official start to the Thanksgiving/Christmas season. It's the perfect transition movie between Halloween and Christmastime.

Even as adults, we love and appreciate this movie in all its glory. Every character has a purpose, has a funny or poignant line, and adds a little something else to this movie's wonderment. The voice actors and actresses, as well as those who sing their parts, do spectacular jobs with their delivery. Each and every song is so perfectly sung and worded that we find ourselves singing along the whole way through it. Danny Elfman scored this movie, as well as did the singing voice for Jack Skellington...you really feel his emotions as he sings "Jack's Lament," in particular.

It's great to see a world ripped from the strange mind of Tim Burton. We also love that this movie is stop-motion animation (and executed flawlessly). It makes us appreciate the movie all the more because of the labor of love and time it took to bring the characters to life. It's in both of our top favorite animated films list.

This movie is truly magical.

My Rating: 10/10
BigJ's Rating: 10/10
IMDB's Rating: 8.0/10
Rotten Tomatoes Rating: 96%
Do we recommend this movie: ABSOLUTELY YES!!!

2 comments:

  1. Great idea!
    I recommend "Off Season" as a good one for the day after Thanksgiving, or the middle of the summer. Or any time really, but those might be the best.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I usually like to watch The Nightmare Before Christmas during October, although November sounds like a great month to watch this movie now that you mentioned it! Great review!

    Check out my review of The Nightmare Before Christmas here:

    http://surrealmoviesandtvblog.blogspot.com/2014/07/movie-review-nightmare-before-christmas.html

    ReplyDelete