The triumph of stop motion

Rating: 10/10 (30 July 1999)

There's life in stop motion yet. Burton and Selick's film is a fine retort to `Toy Story'; or at least it would have been if `Toy Story' had been made first. Fluid, three-dimensional animation in a completely designed world - that's what the two films have in common, but `The Nightmare Before Christmas' looks undeniably better. Partly it's the more imaginative art direction. Partly, also, it's just the fact that there's something enervating about digital effects, and something special about using real, physical artwork, and photographing it. I don't know how well the world of Halloween will stand up over the years, but no-one will forget what it looks like.
The plot alarmingly resembles that of a Rankin/Bass TV special, but with more teeth. Jack Skellington, ruler of the land of Halloween, falls in love with the land of Christmas, and decides to conquer it. The difference between `Nightmare' and its dismal TV cousins is that the land of Halloween really is a grisly place. (Gorgeous, but grisly.) Jack Skellington is a gentle ruler with an imperfect hold on power. (Santa Claus, by contrast, is not quite the innocent he appears to be.) It all ends a little too soon: I would have liked to see more attention paid to the story after all the fun scene-setting. Still, it's a delicious movie.