Review of The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) by Dan H — 22 Oct 2013

I always used to find The Nightmare Before Christmas a bit weird, but now that I'm older and have re-watched it I find that I love the film even more than I used to. The stop-motion animation and character design are superb, the songs are fantastic, the story is unique, and I LOVE the ideas the filmmakers had for what a combination of the Halloween and Christmas holidays would be like. The film is creepy, jolly fun. I'm surprised to say that this film actually gets better the older you are. Even today, I can still say that I haven't seen another film quite like Nightmare Before Christmas (although Burton has tried to replicate the look and feel of this film many times with only middling results, Corpse Bride anyone?).

In an age where we consistently get the same old thing over and over again, it's not hard to feel like Jack Skellington does at the beginning of this film. Luckily, Nightmare Before Christmas remains as one of the more unique and different films you can sample today which is one of the reasons why it is still such a breath of fresh air today. It's not a Halloween film and it's not a Christmas film, it's actually both. It's been 20 years since Nightmare Before Christmas was first released, but even today it hasn't aged one bit. It's just as magical and unique as it ever was, thank God.