The Nightmare Before Christmas

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General		Extras
Category	Fantasy	Theatrical Trailer(s)	None
Rating		Other Trailer(s)	None
Year Released	1993	Commentary Tracks	None
Running Time	73:04 minutes	Other Extras	None
RSDL/Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Movie
Region	2,4	Director	Henry Selick
Studio Distributor	Warner Home Video	Starring	Chris Sarandon Catherine O'Hara William Hickey Glenn Shadix Ken Page Danny Elfman
RRP	$34.95	Music	Danny Elfman

    And what an intriguing story he wrote! On the face of it, an exquisitely different Christmas story, but with a lot of depth if you wish to delve. Set in Halloweentown, where the social highlight of the year is the annual Halloween event, masterminded by the Pumpkin King, Jack Skellington (Chris Sarandon). Only problem is that Jack is getting a little jaded by the whole Halloween thing and seeks something more. During an excursion into the woods to seek answers to his feelings, he discovers the doors to all the major holidays, and gets sucked into the Christmas door. Jack finds himself in a happy, colourful place so different from Halloweentown that so affects him that he determines to bring the joys of Christmastown to his fellow citizens - a decidedly odd lot of characters (although you have to love the two faced mayor (Glenn Shadix)). Naturally enough, the ghoulish characters of Halloweentown have a little trouble coming to grips with Christmas, resulting in some slight problems. These problems are manifested in Jack taking Santa's place for the Christmas Eve delivery run, after Santa (Ed Ivory) is kidnapped. Naturally the recipients of Jack's deliveries are not impressed, and eventually he is shot down to prevent further deliveries. Meantime, the only reasonably sane (Santa's description) inhabitant of Halloweentown, Sally (Catherine O'Hara), has attempted to rescue Santa but failed. Jack sees the error of his ways and rescues Santa in time to save Christmas.

    Just as his later Mar's Attacks! was a homage to B-grade science fiction films, this is pretty much Tim Burton's homage to all those great Christmas stories, albeit with a very different twist. It is also a supreme homage to the art of stop-motion animation, which has to some extent fallen out of use due to advances in computer animation. Whilst the blurb on the DVD cover does get a little carried away - I am quite sure Ray Harryhausen would have something to say about "through innovative artistry of stop-motion animation" - there is no doubt that this demonstrates how good stop-motion animation can be. Watching this again on DVD after years feasting on a VHS tape, it is amazing how well done the animation is. And even more staggering is that this was done on such tiny sets. Some years ago I had the good fortune to visit Disney-MGM Studios in Orlando and they had on display some of the sets used in the film, and they just blew me away for size and detail. DVD also brings out the use of the special effects very well, and it is easy to see why this earned on Oscar nomination in 1993 for best visual effects.

Video

    The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.78:1, and it is 16x9 enhanced. Note that the packaging is slightly inaccurate in stating a 1.66:1 ratio.

    The transfer is generally very sharp throughout, with a beautiful clarity to it that really brings out the detail in the miniature sets. There was only the odd moment of lack of sharpness, which did not in my view detract from the film.

    Whilst the colours are deliberately muted and drab in Halloweentown scenes, they are nonetheless very vibrant and give at times astonishing depth to the transfer. The scenes in Christmastown are on the other hand quite bright and vibrant and provide a great contrast between the two places and their essential characteristics. There was no hint of oversaturation in the colours at all.

    There did not appear to be any MPEG artefacts nor any video artefacts, apart from the very smallest of hints of telecine wobble at around the 30:00 mark. Whether this is a transfer problem or a master problem I do not know, but I would suspect the latter (one would presume that one of the inherent problems of stop-motion animation is slight camera movement between shots). Film artefacts were present, most notably earlier in the film, but these were not at all distracting from the film.

Audio

    There are three audio tracks on the DVD, all Dolby Digital 5.1 efforts: the default English, French and Italian. Naturally I listened to the English default, although I dabbled with the Italian track, which is not as vibrant a sound.

    Dialogue was clear and easy to understand throughout.

    If you want to worry about audio sync in an animated film, then why bother with animated films?

    Well, Danny Elfman came up with a suitably ghoulish score here, plus some songs, in his usual style and a damned fine effort it is too: this contributes so much to the film, with some especially memorable tunes that get the old foot tapping along unconsciously. This copped a Grammy nomination in 1993 for best musical album for children: it did not win but the nomination was highly deserved. I doubt the film would have been half as effective without the Danny Elfman score.

    Then you have some very fine use of the surround channels in the remastered soundtrack, with some lovely detail especially through the rear channels when required. Whilst most of the action is through the front channels, the imaginatively restrained use of the rear channels really added to the enjoyment. The resultant sound picture is very convincing indeed.

    The bass channel did not get an awful lot of action, but was effectively used where necessary in crashes and so on.

Menu

• 16x9 enhancement

• Nothing!

    The video transfer is very good.

    The audio transfer is very good.

    Extras ... no, no, no, no!

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall

© Ian Morris
22nd October 1999