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Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas 3D (2006)

Director: Henry Selick

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From Time Out London

Probably the single neatest expression of Tim Burton’s cute-gothic outsider sensibility, this highly likeable 1993 stop-motion fable also proves a perfect match for Disney’s impressive new 3D technology. The spindly, ragged tactility that always made ‘The Nightmare Before Christmas’ such a visual treat now leaps from the screen, its undead stars coming alive thanks to a process that saw the meticulously crafted original translated frame by frame into a digital model, then processed for viewing through polarised specs. The story sees Jack Skellington, ennui-stricken King of Halloweentown, alighting on a muddle-headedly revitalising scheme: he and his variously rotting, slavering and blood-sucking subjects will co-opt Christmas and deliver a holiday according to their own gruesome lights. Daintily combining cartoon horror-show visuals with quasi-Romantic yearnings and a cracking score and songs by Danny Elfman, ‘Nightmare…’ now makes for a thoroughly pleasurable 3D experience – partly for the wonderfully rendered details of the grotesque puppets and sets, partly because the script’s non-stop momentum suits the roller-coaster photography – and the punchy running time brings things to a close before eye-strain sets in.

Author: Ben Walters

Time Out London Issue 1891: November 15-22 2007


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