Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas is a 1993 animated musical film written and produced by Tim Burton, directed by Henry Selick and scored by Danny Elfman. The film was based on Burton's characters and original story. It was released alongside The Wrong Trousers, a 1993 short film.

The film was a critical and commercial success, with particular praise awarded for Tim Burton's original storyline and stop motion animation, combined with Danny Elfman's creative musical score. Following its theatrical, and home video release, the film has earned a significant following, including merchandise, video games and other related media dedicated to the film. The film has also been theatrically re-released on several occasions, including two remastered 3-D versions released in Disney Digital 3-D on October 20, 2006, and October 19, 2007. It is rated PG for "some scary images" by the MPAA. Disney CEO, Michael Eisner, commented that the film was "too dark for children", therefore it would be decided that Disney release the film under Touchstone Pictures. However, the 2006 3-D version of the film was released under the Walt Disney banner and the upcoming Special Edition DVD is released under the Disney banner.

Summary

The film follows Jack Skellington, the leader of a holiday-themed world known as Halloween Town, who becomes bored of his repetitive lifestyle and eventually stumbles upon the world of Christmas Town; interested in the new world's culture, Jack attempts to combine the two holidays, with disastrous results.

Synopsis

The film begins in Halloween Town, a magical world inhabited by various creatures who make elaborate plans for Halloween every year on October 31, hoping for each Halloween to be superior to the last ("This is Halloween"). Though the residents of Halloween Town are always eager for a trick or a good scare, they never truly mean to hurt anyone. The land is ruled by Jack Skellington, an undead skeleton who is thought to be the scariest being in the entire world. As the townspeople celebrate their annual ceremony, Jack wonders whether there is more to life than scaring people ("Jack's Lament"). Meanwhile, Sally, a Frankenstein's monster-like Rag Doll, pines for Jack from afar, although she is constantly thwarted by her domineering creator, Doctor Finklestein.

While wandering in the hinterlands, Jack and his ghostly pet dog, Zero, encounter portals leading to other holiday-themed worlds. Jack accidentally enters Christmas Town, a land of eternal winter, and is amazed by the population's joyfulness ("What's This?"). Jack, wishing to embrace this culture, quickly returns to Halloween Town, where he presents the townspeople with his slightly inaccurate impressions of Christmas. While Jack may slightly understand Christmas, the townspeople do not understand it at all and compare everything Jack says to their ideas of Halloween. Nonetheless interested in the holiday, the townspeople agree to celebrate Christmas this year ("Town Meeting Song").

Jack decides to operate the holiday, eventually becoming obsessed with Christmas and deciding to usurp the role of ""Sandy Claws", as Jack mistakenly calls Santa Claus ("Jack's Obsession"). Every resident is assigned a task, including Sally who, alone of them, fears that his plans will lead to ruin. There is some foreshadowing to suggest that she is correct; because the people of Halloween Town have lived all their lives by scaring people, the Christmas gifts and decorations they create are more frightening and grotesque than pleasing. Jack ignores Sally's warning and commissions her to create his Christmas outfit. Jack then assigns Lock, Shock, and Barrel, a trio of mischievous, child-like monsters representing trick-or-treaters, to transport 'Sandy Claws' to Halloween Town ("Kidnap the Sandy Claws"). They, after mistakenly capturing (and, on Jack's orders, returning) the Easter Bunny, successfully kidnap Santa. Against Jack's wishes and largely for their own amusement, the trio deliver Santa to the lair of Oogie Boogie, a gambling-addict boogey man who plots to play a game with Santa's life ("Oogie Boogie's Song").

Christmas Eve arrives soon after. Although Sally attempts to stop him, Jack embarks into the sky on a coffin-like sled pulled by skeletal reindeer (created by Finklestein), hoping to deliver presents to children around the world. While the townspeople are overjoyed, Sally wanders off alone to be miserable ("Sally's Song"). As Jack begins delivering gifts, children are horrified by their monstrous, animated presents, which include shrunken heads, man-eating wreaths, vampiric teddy bears, 30-foot snakes, and pull-string ducks dotted with bloody bullet holes. Their parents believe Jack to be an imposter attempting to imitate Santa, and the military is eventually commissioned to shoot Jack out of the sky. Jack gets shot with a missile and crashes into a cemetery; the townspeople witness this and believes that Jack did not survive (even for one of the undead), but in reality he recovers from a faint. Although he is initially depressed by the destruction he had caused, he realizes he is still the ruler of Halloween Town and can bring joy to the world in his own way ("Poor Jack").

Sally attempts to free Santa, only to be captured by Oogie Boogie. Just as they are about to be killed by immersion in a foul stew, Jack arrives and challenges their captor. Oogie Boogie flees, placing his complex, sophisticated, deadly gaming machines in Jack's path as obstacles. However, Oogie Boogie becomes tangled in one of his own machines and is (with Jack's assistance) split open, revealing himself to be merely an animated sackful of insects. Most of Oogie's "bugs" fall into the stew and are boiled alive. A final bug, believed to be the "main bug", attempts to flee, but is squashed by Santa.

Freed, Santa reprimands Jack before setting off to correct Jack's Christmas by exchanging all of the frightening toys for more pleasant playthings. After Santa leaves, Jack asks Sally of how she had gotten into Oogie's casino. Sally tries to tell Jack she wanted to help him, but only stutters. Jack then realizes that Sally loves him. Jack and Sally then return to Halloween Town, aided by the Mayor and a reformed Lock, Shock, and Barrel. Santa flies over Halloween Town and gives it snow as a gift to the town, signifying that there be no hard feelings between him and Jack. The townspeople are confused at first, but start to play in the snow, and soon realize that there is to the world more than just scaring people. Sally discovers that she has been replaced in Doctor Finklestein's service by another creation (who purposely bears a very strong resemblance to the Doctor himself), leaving her free to pursue Jack's attention. She picks a flower and heads towards Spiral Hill, and Jack notices she's leaving the celebration. As she sits on the hill, Jack follows her and the two realize they are "simply meant to be." They then share a kiss while Zero contently looks on from afar ("Finale/Reprise").

Cast and characters

• Danny Elfman plays Clown with the Tear-Away Face
• Sherwood Ball plays Mummy Kid and Vampire
• Debi Durst plays Corpse Mom, Corpse Kid and Zeldaborn
• Randy Crenshaw plays Mr. Hyde, Behemoth and Vampire
• Kerry Katz plays Monster Under the Stairs, Corpse Dad and Vampire
• Susan McBride plays Helgamine
• Greg Proops plays Harlequin Demon, Saxophone Player and Devil
• Carmen Twillie plays Monster Under the Bed and Undersea Gal
• Glenn Walters plays Wolfman

On the soundtrack album, Patrick Stewart voices the opening narrative poem. A second poem, also read by Stewart, is included before the end credits music; in this passage, the narrator describes a visit he made to Halloween Town many years after the events of the film, where he finds Jack with "four or five skeleton children at hand". The narrator asks Jack if given the chance, knowing what he knows now and knowing what he knew then, if he would do it all over again, and Jack smiles and asks, "Wouldn't you?".

Initial conception

The original ideas for the film came to Tim Burton while working as an animator for Disney. While at work, Burton scribbled out the poem on a piece of paper as well as a few drawings. These initial versions only included Jack, Zero and Santa Claus.^[1] Burton did pitch the film to Walt Disney Feature Animation as a traditionally-animated project, but it was rejected for seeming too frightening towards young children.

Burton has stated that he was inspired by being at a store and seeing them taking down the Halloween merchandise and changing it out for Christmas displays: the juxtaposition of ghouls and goblins with Santa Claus and his reindeer sparked his imagination.^[2] Burton also loved holiday movies such as How The Grinch Stole Christmas and Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. In an interview, he described The Nightmare Before Christmas as almost an opposite of The Grinch, because instead of wanting to destroy Christmas but instead save it, Jack accidentally destroys it while trying to celebrate it.

Production

The Nightmare Before Christmas marked the first time that a stop-motion movie had been attempted at this scale (Unlike many Rankin/Bass productions). Because of this fact, a great deal of imagination and inventiveness had to be used in making the film. In order to produce the film, Tim Burton assembled a hand-picked group of animators, artists, and crew members to work on the film and founded a production company called Skellington Studios. As an artist himself, Burton was very involved in the production process, guiding the production crew as to the way the film should look and feel, even limiting them to orange, black and white as the primary colors of Halloween Town. Burton also encouraged the artists to not use their dominant hands so as to give their drawings his trademark feel.

Once the sets had been approved they were then made into half scale mock-ups out of cardboard. These were then used as guidelines to build the actual sets. The puppets were constructed with a detailed metal armature as a skeleton, and then placed into molds which were injected with a foam latex. From there they were sent to the fabrication department to be painted and finished. Multiple puppets were made of most of the characters so that they could cycle between the set and fabrication for touch ups.

The crew often had to improvise solutions to problems that they encountered during production. One of these problems was to give facial expressions to the puppets and making them speak. This was accomplished in a number of different fashions. Some puppets had mouths that were moved manually while some of the main puppets, such as Jack, were given hundreds of replaceable heads so that they could have a greater range of expression. The puppet for Sally was given interchangeable masks that were integrated behind her hairline because her hair was too long to be sculpted for the number of heads that would be needed. Another problem that was faced was allowing the animators to work on the sets. Because some of the sets were so large, the animators were worried that they would have to reach too far to move the puppets. This problem was solved by building the sets in different sections that could be separated when an animator was working and then placed back together for the shot.

The actual production of filming was a very slow and grueling process, taking over 3 years to finish. The animators worked on multiple sound stages at once to improve productivity on the film but a week?s work was still only a minute?s worth of actual film. The animators had to be very cautious on the sets as a simple thing such as a bump to one of the puppets could ruin a shot and they would have to start from scratch.

At the finish of the production of the film, the sets and puppets all faced different fates. Henry Selick kept a great deal of props from the film in his personal collection, and some of the animators also took home the puppets. Many of the sets were simply discarded as there were so many of them and they took up a great deal of space. A number of the puppets with a more human like structure were cut open and the armature taken out, as they were custom made and expensive. The Town Hall can currently be seen on display by the staircase leading from the ground to the 1st floor at Planet Hollywood in Downtown Disney, Orlando, Florida.

Future releases

2-Disc Special Edition

Cover of the 2008 DVD re-release

Ultimate Collector's Edition

An Ultimate Collector's Edition DVD is scheduled to be available for August 26, 2008. The Ultimate Collector's Edition includes the two-disc DVD, along with a bust of Jack Skellington, with a detachable beard and hat.

Blu-ray

A scheduled Blu-ray release will be available on August 26, 2008. It will include a digital copy of the film, and the features from the DVD re-release.

Music

Composed by Danny Elfman, the score was nominated for the 1993 Golden Globe for best original score. For the film's 2006 re-release in Disney Digital 3-D, a 2-disc special edition of the soundtrack was released, featuring covers of several of the film's songs by Fall Out Boy, Panic at the Disco, Marilyn Manson, Fiona Apple, and She Wants Revenge.

On September 30th, 2008, Walt Disney Records will release "Nightmare Revisited," a collection of covers and new recordings inspired by the 1993 film "Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas". Danny Elfman re-recorded "Opening" and "Closing" from the film's score, and Korn, Amy Lee, Plain White T's, Rise Against, Rodrigo y Gabriela and Flyleaf contribute their versions of songs from the soundtrack.

Reception

The Nightmare Before Christmas opened on October 15, 1993 to very positive reviews. Roger Ebert awarded the film three-and-a-half stars (Out of four), praising the film as an "enormous achievement." He went on to compare the film's fantasy elements to that of Metropolis and Star Wars writing that the film features "visual richness so abundant, [the film] deserves more than one viewing."^[3] Popular critic James Berardinelli shared this opinion, writing that "The Nightmare Before Christmas has something to offer just about everyone." He stated that "the film is designed for all but the youngest children" and praised the film as "an amazing achievement." ^[4]

However, a select few critics remained unimpressed, believing the film favored visual effects over a good storyline. Critic Robert Roten awarded the film a C+, believing the film "fell short" of the "warmth and humor" of Burton's previous film, Edward Scissorhands. Although he believed the film to be "very clever," he ultimately concluded that "it never lives up to the promise of its visual brilliance."^[5] Even Berardinelli, who awarded the film three-and-a-half stars (out of four), believed the film's musical score to be seriously flawed. He negatively compared the film's musical numbers to that of Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin, writing that "the tunes are uniformly unmemorable." He ultimately believed the poor musical numbers represented the film's "most serious failing."^[6]

The Nightmare Before Christmas opened in two theaters and grossed $191,232 for a per-theater average of $95,616^[7], which stands as the thirteenth-highest opening weekend average on record^[8]. Two weeks later, the film opened in 1,654 theaters and grossed $8.2 million^[9], becoming the number-one film in the United States for two weeks^[10]. The film eventually grossed over $50 million domestically^[11], which would equal over $79.46 million adjusted for inflation^[12]. On October 27, 2000, the film was re-issued in 72 theaters but failed to match the success of the film's initial release; it ultimately grossed just $376,586 domestically and did not receive a worldwide release^[13].

The film was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score in 1994, competing alongside Schindler's List and The Piano, though it was defeated by Kitaro's composition for Heaven & Earth.^[14] In the same year, the film was nominated for the Academy Award for Visual Effects, a rare honor for an animated film, though it was defeated by Jurassic Park.^[15]

On October 20, 2006, the film was again re-released in select theaters, albeit in a much different format; the film was converted into Disney Digital 3-D, recreating the film's appearance and attempting to enhance the movie-going experience. Opening in 168 theaters, the film grossed $3.2 million for a per-theater average of $19,505, which stood as the highest per-theater average of any film opening that weekend.^[16] Although the film was front-loaded^[17], it was still very successful, grossing $8.7 million overall. The film was again released in 3-D the following year, and grossed a larger $14.5 million overall.^[18] It will be rereleased as a 2-disc special edition DVD and Blu-ray in August 2008.

Legacy

• Although The Nightmare Before Christmas was a box office success upon its initial release, many critics believed the film would prove too frightening for younger children and would be better-suited among older children. Since its release, the film has become a well-known production, has earned the status of a cult classic, and is extremely popular among American, British, Australian, Canadian and Japanese teenagers.

• Retailers such as Hot Topic, Newbury Comics and Spencer's Gifts are well-known promoters of the film, offering apparel, music, and video games dedicated to the film.

• In 1996, Skellington Productions produced another stop-motion musical film, James and the Giant Peach, based on the children's novel of the same name by popular author Roald Dahl. Although the film boasted a more well-known voice cast than The Nightmare Before Christmas (featuring actors Simon Callow, Richard Dreyfuss and Susan Sarandon, among others), it failed to achieve Nightmares success, grossing far below its predecessor.^[19]

• Tim Burton later produced a third stop-motion musical film, Corpse Bride, which was released theatrically in 2005. Although the film earned strong critical acclaim and was a box office success,^[20] it failed to reach the same level of overall success as The Nightmare Before Christmas. Of the three films, Nightmare boasts the highest rating on The Internet Movie Database^[21][22][23] and website Rotten Tomatoes.

• Since 2006, Matt Eisenmann and Christina Taylor have been working on the script for a Broadway production of the movie. There is no expectation of when they will be done. It may use puppetry similar to the broadway version of The Lion King, since a good portion of the characters are monsters or toys.

• Blink-182 makes a reference to this movie in their song "[[I Miss You (Blink-182 song)|I Miss You

]]", "We can live like Jack and Sally if you want/Where you can always find me/We'll have Halloween on Christmas/And in the night, we'll wish this never ends"

• In addition to popular fame, the movie has been synchronized with by many bands including the band the Coffin Caddies in their 2007 album release titled "I dream of Jack-O-Lanterns".

• Frank Iero, the rhythm gutarist for rock quintet My Chemical Romance, lists The Nightmare Before Christmas as one of his favourite movies.

Haunted Mansion Holiday

For the past five years, the Disneyland in California and Tokyo Disneyland in Japan have received a Nightmare Before Christmas themed overlay, entitled The Haunted Mansion Holiday in California and Holiday Nightmare in Japan, for their Haunted Mansion attractions. The attractions are closed in September (August at Tokyo) each year for themes to be completely transformed, and open again themed in late September until January of the next year. The attraction generally has a one night opening event each year that includes special guests, a dinner, special merchandise, and a ride through the attraction, although the Happiest Celebration on Earth halted that in Disneyland in 2005. Starting in 2001, the ride has included a score that incorporates music from the film, written by film composer Danny Elfman, and adapted specifically for the ride by John Debney.^[24]

Video games

• A video game sequel was released in 2005. The Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge is an action/adventure game developed by Capcom from Japan for the PlayStation 2 and Xbox systems.^[25] Intended to be a sequel to the movie, the game features the return of all the well-known characters in a new and arguably darker story with upgraded versions of the film's songs. In the story, Jack leaves Halloween Town to satisfy his curiosity. During Jack's absence, unfortunately, Oogie Boogie is reconstructed by Lock, Shock, and Barrel. By the time Jack returns, Oogie Boogie has taken over Halloween Town and tricked its people into thinking Jack has abandoned them. Jack then must stop Oogie Boogie. The gameplay is similar to that of the Devil May Cry series, and the game received average to mediocre reviews.

• A Game Boy Advance game, The Nightmare Before Christmas: The Pumpkin King came out in fall 2005. The opposite of the PlayStation 2 and Xbox versions, the GBA game works as a prequel to the movie. The Pumpkin King is a side-scrolling action platformer (similar to Metroid and Castlevania) in which the player controls Jack Skellington and use a number of different weapons to fight enemies and traverse obstacles. The side-scrolling adventure game is a prequel, detailing on how Jack's first battle against Oogie Boogie to become the Pumpkin King.

• Halloween Town also appeared in Square Enix/Disney's Kingdom Hearts video game series. In this game, Jack tries to create an artificial heart so he can control the Heartless for use in his "Heartless Halloween". His plan goes haywire when Oogie Boogie steals the heart, ingests it, and tries to use it to control the Heartless for his own purposes. Jack then joins Sora and the others to stop Oogie Boogie's plans. Jack can also join Sora's party whenever they are in Halloween Town. He was also included in the GameBoy Advance game Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories as a Friend Card sporting his own unique Sleights, or combos. Halloween Town appeared once more in the PlayStation 2 sequel, Kingdom Hearts II, which more closely followed the events of the film.

Card and board games

A collectible card game and a board game based on the movie were released in 2005 and 2004 respectively. The Nightmare Before Christmas Trading Card Game and Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas Game were both produced by NECA.

Comics

The characters of The Nightmare Before Christmas have also appeared in the realm of comic books, more specifically in manga. An adaptation of the movie by Jun Asaga was published by Kodansha and later translated in English by Disney Press. Despite its popularity in the game Kingdom Hearts, the world "Halloween Town" failed to appear in the manga adaptation of the game, causing many to turn away from the manga by Shiro Amano, published by Bros. Comics EX (and later translated into English by Tokyopop). An allusion to the movie is also provided in the manga The Wallflower by Tomoko Hayakawa. A fan-work webcomic based on The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy called "Grim Tales from down below", makes Halloween Town a vital part of the main plot in the first saga. Jack is still the Pumpkin King, and is uncle and possibly one of the godfathers of the protagonist, Grim. Jr.

See also

• The Nightmare Before Christmas: The Pumpkin King
• The Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge
• List of animated feature films
• List of characters in The Nightmare Before Christmas
• List of stop-motion films

References

External links

• 2007 3-D release - Link to the official site for the 2007 3-D release, including a theater locator.
• Nightmare Before Christmas - original poem by Tim Burton
• Don Markstein's Toonopedia entry on The Night Before Christmas
• The Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack information at scorereviews.com
• Film Review
• HalloweenTown - TNBC Fan Site
• TNBC Cult At VF.Com - TNBC Fan Site

ca:Malson abans de Nadal cs:Ukradené Vánoce cy:The Nightmare Before Christmas da:The Nightmare Before Christmas de:Nightmare Before Christmas es:The Nightmare Before Christmas fr:L'Étrange Noël de Monsieur Jack hr:Predbo?i?na no?na mora is:Martröđ á jólanótt it:Nightmare Before Christmas he:????? ????? ?? ????? nl:Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas ja:????????????????? no:Et fřrjulsmareritt pl:Miasteczko Halloween pt:The Nightmare Before Christmas ru:?????? ????? ?????????? (??????????) simple:The Nightmare Before Christmas fi:Painajainen ennen joulua sv:The Nightmare Before Christmas zh:?????