- davidahallnum5
The Nightmare Before Christmas 3D Blu-ray Review
Updated: Apr 8, 2023
The Nightmare Before Christmas is a 1993 animated musical about a skeleton named Jack, the king the Halloweentown. He seems to be at the height of his popularity when he finds out he's bored with the life he leads, waiting all year round for Halloween just to do the same old scaring, dancing, and singing routine. However, all that changes one day when he accidentally stumbles into Christmastown and discovers a brand new sense of joy unlike anything back home. Wanting to share this newfound wonder with everyone, he gathers everyone in Halloweentown together with the purpose of taking Christmas for themselves and giving Santa the day off. But will the execution of this idea live up to Jack's noble intentions?
Nightmare is fun, creative romp from beginning to end. I hesitate to call it shear cinematic perfection, and it's not quite for everybody. But on the whole, it still remains an enduring, weird, but utterly enjoyable film. There are so many things to praise here here that I hardly know where to begin. I guess for starters, I'll bring up the animation. As everyone knows, Nightmare is absolutely stunning. The stop motion environment is incredibly detailed and the movements never feel awkward. There are times such as when a vampire in the background will move only move parts of himself slightly and other times when people like Jack Skellington are moving all over the place. But while it might feel a bit quirky, it certainly doesn't hinder the animation quality of the film at all. If anything, it only enhances it as it allows important story characters like Jack to express themselves in a visually engaging manner.
But animation isn't just Nightmare's only strong point. Another great one is the songs, which are all catchy, expressive, and drive the plot forward. Getting across 11 songs in a 76 minute film is not an easy task. But they all work so well with the story that they fit right in. Danny Elfman puts in all the necessary effort and personality into this music not just so it'll work, but also so it'll shine. I dare you to not find yourself humming something from Nightmare at least once in your lifetime.
The story itself is also immensely creative and fun, though it's also why plenty of people might not quite get into the film the same way most others do. I think part of it has to do with how simple the story is. There are themes such as how good intentions, or divine intervention, can't quite be shared with others unless they too have experienced what you have experienced or how even if you don't succeed, the effort is still worth it. But they're all pretty much surface level. And whatever deeper messages you could try pulling out of it, maybe something like human purpose, are buried beneath the film's louder musical elements, stylized visuals, and technical marvels. That doesn't mean the story doesn't hold up at all. It still remains effective and entertaining. But it's not anything you might quite get as emotionally invested in as something like The Lion King, another Disney movie, or Edward Scissorhands, another movie from Tim Burton.
That being said, the story still does a great job at entertaining. Where else are you going to see a macabre, dark Halloween-esque type place contrast the warm comfort of Christmastime? And as a whole, the film itself is definitely a strange, but wonderful experience. It blows by at a runtime of an hours and sixteen minutes. But what it gives you in that time amounts to a mesmerizing musical ride that will leave most viewers with something to scream about. Once again, it's not without a couple of gripes and it won't be everyone's cup of tea. But I'm happy to say it was certainly mine. And if any of you enjoy Tim Burton's bizarre, twisted style with some catchy music and an original story to go along with it, you might just say the same.
OVERALL FILM RATING: 4.5/5
The 3D in The Nightmare Before Christmas is a very strange thing to discuss. On one hand, there are plenty of drawbacks to prevent it from being a strongly recommended film. But on the other hand, there enough moments that are stellar in 3D to make it somewhat of a shame not to recommend. Before I dive into the effects themselves, I think it would be fair to provide with some context behind this film's 3D.
The Nightmare Before Christmas wasn't initially planned for 3D. It was converted in 2006 and re-released in theaters in that special format. Apparently, it became so popular that it got brought back to theaters in 3D in October of several following years. So the question we have to ask ourselves here is: was the conversion worth it? Just by looking at the film's twisted Burton-esque setting and feel, Nightmare certainly feels like a shoe in for 3D. And in many ways, it is. However, there are plenty of technical errors abound that prevent me from really appreciating the 3D version of the film as much as I feel like I should.
For starters, there is a very weird effect that shows up many-a-times throughout the film where characters or objects that should be behind another characters or object appear in front of them instead. One of many examples of this occurs early on in the movie when Sally is hiding behind a tombstone but she appears in front of it even though she's clearly behind it. I believe this to be an accidental oversight of the conversion team. This was 2006 after all, before 3D conversion teams have actually learned to master their craft. Some people might pass this off this issue as "ghosting," which for those of you who don't know, is a phenomenon that occurs whenever information from one eye view accidentally transfers to the other eye view, creating a weird image. This happened with me an unfortunate amount of times during The Polar Express 3D. However, I don't believe this to be the case here, mostly, as this leads me to another technical problem I faced, which is this.
The characters and objects sometimes took on weird shapes. There have been times the background, or a faraway hill looked like a backdrop (which might not have been too far from the truth). Other times, objects in the foreground also have a cardboard cutout look. And other times, the 3D shape would just be off on some people, including Sally who I mentioned earlier. Once again, I believe this might have been a fault of Disney's first time conversion team. But I would really like them to go over this film again and iron out the wrinkles. And trust me, there are some pretty big wrinkles.
Now enough about the negatives. What about the positive aspects of the 3D? Well, I'm glad you asked because from here, it only gets better. Now, a good amount of the first act contains those issues I previously mentioned. But that aside, there is actually a pretty decent amount of depth on display. It's not quite limitless, but it brings Halloweentown into a staggering new light, making the opening "This is Halloween" sequence feel all the more engaging. With creatures and ghosts coming at you and the way the camera smoothly moved throughout these bizarre locations, you can tell the 3D version of Nightmare is going to be an engaging experience.
Inside the screen, everything contains strange Burton-esque 3D shapes which make the trip to the third dimension worth it. As I mentioned earlier, Jack Skellington is one of, if not the, most expressive character in the whole movie. And in 3D when he moves his long slender arms and legs to and fro all around the frame, it's certainly mesmerizing. And most of the other characters also retain interesting shapes throughout (except for Zero, who's ghost-like appearance gives off a weird effect in 3D, though it once again may have been the fault of the conversion team). The mayor, Santa Claus, Lock, Stock, and Barrel, Sally, and even the Boogie Man all are much more fun to watch moving around the screen in three-dimensional glory.
But it's not just the characters that steal the show. Often times, it's the environment around them that does that. The buildings go off way into the distance, the moon looks like it's properly placed in the sky, and the hills (even if they take a bit of a cardboard cut-out look) are much more entrancing with visible separation between them, especially in the graveyard scene. Once again, the depth isn't particularly vast. But the settings of the film all just benefit from it in enjoyable ways. Christmastown has all it's big colorful buildings, falling snow, and distant mountains. The Boogie Man's lair has lots of glowing light, but also many-a-skeletons, dangling objects, and torture devices that are eye-candy in 3D. And even the human neighborhood near the end retains proper space and depth. But of course, Halloweentown benefits plenty in 3D with all it's oddly shaped buildings, strangely shaped objects such as tombstones, gates, and walls, and all the other remaining details of this world Nightmare has to give. One pretty funny moment that I felt took advantage of this was during a scene where the mayor went up to Jack Skellington's house and climbs up a flight of very steep stairs to get to Jack's door. All the while, the camera is looking down from the top, making clear the distance between Jack's door and the ground below. And when the mayor is moving up the stairs, he's coming closer to us. This shot I felt could've used some tweaking as some of the shapes were slightly off, but it's a neat usage of 3D none the less.
And while the film isn't incredibly deep, it certainly has it's standout moments. One very notable example comes when Jack is off in his sleigh about to deliver gifts. The stars in the night sky look very far away, the shape of Jack, his skeleton reindeer, his coffin, and the cloud around him all are fun to watch, and the distance between him and ground is almost unbelievable. Whenever we, or he, looks down unto the neighborhood below, the depth is nothing less than stunning. Another great standout moment with the 3D occurs in the Boogie Man's palace with all the objects I mentioned above moving around in fun ways during Oogie Boogie's dance number.
While the film isn't too huge on pop-outs, as with most post-converted movies, there are a few pretty notable ones. Some of them come from in the start of the film with ghosts and monsters coming out of the screen, though they don't protrude the screen as much as they could've. Moments with Zero and transparent objects such as smoke and fog do pop out quite a bit. Jack Skellington's head also makes a couple of visits to our world every now and then. However, the ones that are worth talking about include a scene with Oogie Boogie's dice getting thrown out into the audience, Oogie Boogie himself, a missile, and even a hockey puck. The former and last two are pretty good flinch-worthy moments.
On top of all that, I didn't suffer from any health effects whatsoever such as eye strain, nausea, or a headache. I have heard some people complain about the brightness level in the movie, calling it dark and working against the stereo. However, the opening "This is Halloween" sequence aside, I thought the rest of the film remained reasonably bright and watchable throughout.
So yeah. The 3D in Nightmare Before Christmas is kind of a mixed bag. Tim Burton's style, motions, and environment are all very well suited for 3D and there are some moments in this film that amaze in the added dimension. But on the other hand, it falls short of a strong recommendation due to the more-frequent-than-I-desired technical issues I talked about above. This film tows the very fine line between a "great" rating and a "good" rating. Nightmare Before Christmas has some "great" moments that are certainly lots of 3D fun. But I think as a whole, it probably falls into the "good" category. That doesn't mean it isn't worth watching. All it means is that it isn't really a must-buy. Once again, I feel like if this film got picked up again by a much more modern conversion team (maybe the ones who did Jaws a while back), it could've been 3D greatness. As it is though, it still remains a fun experience and my preferred way to watch The Nightmare Before Christmas, even if it does have a few annoying flaws.
3D RATING: GOOD (with some great scenes)
More sources that review this movie's 3D (the opinions reflected in the review may not always match up with my own. But if you want a second opinion on this film's 3D, these are some sources I recommend checking out):
High Def Digest's Review: https://bluray.highdefdigest.com/4439/nightmare_christmas3d.html
Go Find Fun's Review: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGPFrL0eDQw
FINAL THOUGHTS:
The Nightmare Before Christmas is a thoroughly delightful movie with great music, incredible visuals, a creative story, and enduring characters. I can understand if some people don't really dig the film as much others. But for those that do, I understand you even more. I mean, what's not to love? It's a fun family-friendly romp that I highly recommend you watch if you haven't already, especially with Halloween right around the corner. Though if you ask me, I'd say Nightmare is probably best saved for early November. Now about the 3D, this where I come to a slightly confusing standstill. And if you've read the review above, you know exactly what I'm talking about. I'd say, if you're not all that much into 3D to start with, Nightmare isn't anything terribly special like Avatar and probably won't be at the top of your 3D priority list. But if you're a die hard fan of 3D, this one is worth getting, if you're ok with the issues mentioned above. If you're a Nightmare fan who wants to see this old movie in a new way, you might find a thing or two to like about this 3D presentation. In the end, though, it's all a matter of perspective. Personally, I liked Nightmare's 3D overall in spite of it's negative elements. But a bit like the movie itself, you'll never really know if it's your cup of tea unless you watch it for yourself.
DID YOU LIKE "THE NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS" IN 3D
0%Yes
0%No