The Nightmare Before Christmas DVD > Reviews > "What's This?!"-musical animation for all

Author's product rating:   

Did you enjoy it?	Loved it
Story	Good
Characters / Performances	Outstanding
Special Effects	Good
How does it compare to similar films?	Good

Advantages:	Fun for all the family, catchy songs, excellent unique animation, fun and entertaining
Disadvantages:	May scare very young or sensitive audiences

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

Tim Burton's "The Nightmare Before Christmas" is an excellent family musical animation. The precursor to Tim Burton's "Corpse Bride" (although similar in genre not linked in story) this film is actually better. Both are magical, musical stop motion films meant for the whole family, but this film has better, catchier songs and is generally superior.

For those who do not know what exactly "stop motion" is I will explain. It is a technique where actual puppets or models are made of the characters and sets and each movement is filmed individually. This film was the first feature-length stop motion film and in a generation where CGI and other modern animated techniques are much more common, this film (and method) still looks great. The fantastic figures look great, down to the tiniest detail. They are so loved that figures and busts of the characters can commonly be found in shops. This method brings a certain magical quaintness to the film.

The story revolves around Jack Skellington, the pumpkin king of Halloween town. After growing bored with Halloween Jack stumbles upon the merry land of Christmas town whilst wandering. He immediately falls in love with the place and the whole idea of Christmas. Although well meaning Jack begins to ruins Christmas, kidnapping Santa and taking over himself.

The story has several catchy songs written by the musical maestro that is Danny Elfman. Elfman voices Jack's singing voice too. Danny Elfman who is famous for such music in "The Simpsons", "Desperate Housewives" as well as "The Nightmare Before Christmas" and "Corpse Bride", never disappoints.

Good to watch at Halloween or Christmas (or any time really), this film will entertain the whole family, much like a good Disney film. Unlike Disney, however this film has a slightly dark tone and may cause very young or sensitive children to become scared. There are little devils and slightly creepy creatures in Halloween town as you might expect. Tim Burton loves the macabre, Walt Dis- nee (hehe, sorry I couldn't help it).

Special Bonus features on this special edition disc include:

Deleted scenes and Animated sequences- The deleted scenes and animated sequences are very much unfished but non the less interesting to watch.

Behind the scenes on the studio- Also very interesting. How the film is made, how was involved etc.

Storyboards and image gallery- An excellent extra, really gives you a feel for the incredible amount of work and thought that goes into a film such as this.

Audio commentary and original trailers.- Again very interesting. I always enjoy listening to commentaries. Tim Burton gives a good overview of the film here, sharing his thoughts about the different scenes.

There are also two short films from Tim Burton, one animation, based around a poem written by Burton and one film about a Frankenstein style dog story. Both are very good.

Tim Burton has made many well known movies such as Planet of the Apes, Sleepy Hollow and more recently Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, but this is definitely my favourite film of the collection. It has such a cult following and after watching it, it isn't hard to see why. A really loveable film and quite often on special offer its really an excellent buy for all peoples.