The Nightmare Before Christmas

Happy Halloween. Oh, wait that was two months ago. Oh, wait I used this joke in my review of Gremlins. Regardless Christmas is getting closer so I decided to go away from Christmas and back into Halloween. That's right I am reviewing The Nightmare Before Christmas. So I hope you're in the holiday spirit because it's time to review The Nightmare Before Christmas.

We start on Halloween where all the monsters are celebrating. The head of the celebration is lead by the king of Halloween, Jack Skellington (Chris Sarandon). But after the festivities are over Jack realizes how tired of Halloween he is and goes for a walk through the cemetery and then into the woods. The next day the Mayor of Halloween Town (Glenn Shadix) goes to Jack's house to plan next years Halloween, but he soon realizes that Jack is missing and this puts the whole town in a panic. Meanwhile Jack finds a bunch of mysterious doors in the woods with different symbols on them like a turkey, an Easter Egg, and a four leafed clover. Jack is curious and he goes through a door shaped like a Christmas tree and he ends up in another world. Jack is blown away by how happy and festive it is there and he finds out that he is in Christmas Town. Jack comes back to Halloween Town with the good news and he tells the entire town about Christmas and all the monsters decide they want celebrate Christmas.

Jack is having trouble figuring out how to celebrate Christmas if the people in Christmas Town already do. He also wants to try and figure out the scientific meaning of Christmas before he can celebrate it. So he borrows some equipment from a mad scientist named Dr. Finkelstein (William Hickey). While talking to Dr. Finkelstein about his experiments the doctor's zombie housekeeper Sally (Catherine O'Hara) overhears them talking and that night sneaks out to help Jack. She gives Jack a potion to help with the research. But on the way back to the lab Sally has a premonition about Christmas and it says that it will end in a disaster. Meanwhile Jack finally decides what to do about Christmas. All the monsters start to prepare and Jack gets three kids named Lock (Paul Reubens), Shock (also Catherine O'Hara), and Barrel (Danny Elfman) to kidnap Santa so that Jack can take his place. The first time they mess up and end up kidnapping the Easter Bunny. The second time they get it right and they decide to give Santa to the Boogie Man (Ken Page). Meanwhile Jack is getting ready to leave and give presents to all the children of the world.

***SPOILER ALERT STOP HERE IF YOU DON'T WANT THE END RUINED***

Jack gives toys to all the children of the world. The only problem is that all the toys are evil and want to destroy everything. The army decides to stop Jack and they fire a missile at Jack which causes him to crash. Jack realizes that he needs to set things right so he decides to go back to Halloween Town. Meanwhile Sally tries to free Santa from the Boogie Man but she ends up getting captured. Jack comes in just at the right time and frees Santa and Sally and defeats the Boogie Man. Santa goes to save Christmas and Jacks agrees to stick to his own holiday. The End.

***SPOILERS OVER KEEP READING***

I love The Nightmare Beofore Christmas. The animation is very good and detailed and the character design gives to the style of the movie. The songs are amazing and you'll be singing them for about a week. Jack is a very fun character to follow throughout the movie and it is a great movie for Christmas or Halloween. For once I actually have nothing bad to say about a movie. So yeah The Nightmare Before Christmas is definitely worth a rent this holiday season. See you next time.