The Nightmare Before Christmas (also known as Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas) is a 1993 American stop-motion animated musical fantasy film directed by Henry Selick and written by Caroline Thompson. It tells the tale of Jack Skellington, King of Halloween Town, who stumbles upon Christmas Town and becomes obsessed with celebrating the holiday himself. Danny Elfman composed the score and songs and provided Jack's singing voice, while the principal voice cast includes Chris Sarandon, Ken Page, Catherine O'Hara, Glenn Shadix, William Hickey, Paul Reubens and Ed Ivory.
The Nightmare Before Christmas originated from a poem written by Tim Burton in 1982 while he was working as an animator at Walt Disney Productions. With the critical success of Vincent that same year, Burton began to consider developing the story as either a short film or a half-hour television special, to no avail. Over the years, Burton's thoughts regularly returned to the project, and in 1990 he made a development deal with the Walt Disney Studios. Production, under Burton and Denise Di Novi, started in July 1991. Disney originally released the film under the Touchstone Pictures banner because the studio believed the film's Gothic tone would be "too dark and scary for kids".
The Nightmare Before Christmas premiered at the New York Film Festival on October 9, 1993, and was given a limited release on October 13, before a wide theatrical release on October 29 by Buena Vista Pictures Distribution. The film was met with critical and commercial success upon release, and has since garnered a cult following. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects, a first for an animated film. Thirteen years after its initial release, the film was reissued by Walt Disney Pictures and was re-released annually from 2006 until 2010.
In 2023, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant."
Plot Halloween Town is a fantasy world populated by various monsters and supernatural beings associated with the eponymous holiday. Jack Skellington, the well-respected Pumpkin King, leads the town in organizing its annual celebrations. This year however, Jack is weary of the same routine and longs for something new. Upon discovering trees containing doors to other holiday-themed worlds, Jack stumbles through the one leading to Christmas Town and is fascinated by the unfamiliar holiday.
Jack returns home and shares his discovery with his friends and neighbors, but they struggle to grasp the concept of Christmas, although they relate to its ruler, Santa Claus, or "Sandy Claws" as Jack mistakenly dubs him. After several futile attempts at finding a way to rationally explain Christmas, Jack decides to "improve" the holiday instead. He announces that Halloween Town will take over Christmas this year and assigns Christmas-themed jobs, such as singing carols, making presents and building a sleigh pulled by skeletal reindeer, to various residents.
Sally, the feminine creation of local mad scientist Doctor Finkelstein, experiences a vision predicting that their efforts will end disastrously. Jack, whom she secretly loves, dismisses her warnings and instructs her to make a Santa Claus suit for him. He tasks mischievous trick-or-treating trio Lock, Shock and Barrel with abducting Santa; however, he orders them not to involve their superior Oogie Boogie, a bogeyman with a passion for gambling and Jack's long-time rival, in their plot.
When Lock, Shock and Barrel bring Santa to Halloween Town, Jack tells him that he will take care of Christmas this year and orders the trio to keep Santa safe. However, they disobey Jack's orders and bring Santa to Oogie Boogie, who plots to play a game with Santa's life at stake. As Jack departs to deliver presents in the real world, Sally, after failing to stop him beforehand, attempts to rescue Santa from Oogie, only to be captured herself.
Jack's Halloween-themed presents terrify the real world's populace, who contact the local authorities and are instructed to lock down their homes for protection. The military is alerted and Jack is shot out of the sky, leading Halloween Town's populace to believe he is dead. It is revealed that he survived and has crashed into a nearby cemetery. Bemoaning the trouble that he has caused, Jack realizes he nonetheless enjoyed the experience and that it gave him new ideas for celebrating next Halloween, reigniting his love for the holiday.
Upon returning home, Jack saves Santa and Sally, confronts Oogie Boogie and defeats him by unraveling a thread holding his cloth form together, causing all of the insects inside Oogie to spill out and reduce him to nothing. Though displeased with Jack for his foolish actions and not listening to Sally earlier, Santa makes amends with him and resumes his yearly duties, replacing Jack's presents with genuine ones and saving Christmas.
All of Halloween Town celebrates Jack's return. Santa brings a snowfall to the town, thereby bringing the Christmas spirit upon it, while Jack and Sally finally declare their love for each other.
Voice cast
Danny Elfman (singing voice) and Chris Sarandon (speaking voice) as Jack Skellington, a skeleton known as the "Pumpkin King" of Halloween Town. Elfman was initially cast as the character's singing voice and, after the songs were recorded, Sarandon was cast to match. Elfman additionally voices: Barrel, one of the trick-or-treaters working for Oogie Boogie. The Clown with the Tear-Away Face, an inhabitant of Halloween Town appearing as a unicycle-riding evil clown with a namesake removable face. Catherine O'Hara as: Sally, a rag doll-like creation of Doctor Finkelstein and Jack's love interest. She is a toxicologist who uses various types of poison to liberate herself from the captivity of her creator. She is psychic and has premonitions when something bad is about to happen. O'Hara had previously co-starred in Burton's Beetlejuice. Shock, one of the trick-or-treaters working for Oogie Boogie. William Hickey as Doctor Finkelstein, a mad scientist and the loving and overbearing creator of Sally. He is listed in the credits only as "Evil Scientist" and is only mentioned by name twice in the film. Glenn Shadix as The Mayor of Halloween Town, an enthusiastic leader who conducts town meetings. His double-sided head spins between a "happy" and "sad" face, mirroring his wild mood swings; whereas some career politicians are described as figuratively two-faced, the mayor is literally so. Shadix and Burton had previously worked on Beetlejuice. Paul Reubens as Lock, one of the trick-or-treaters working for Oogie Boogie. Reubens and Burton had previously worked on Pee-wee's Big Adventure and Batman Returns. Ken Page as Oogie Boogie, a villainous bogeyman in Halloween Town who has a passion for gambling and rivalry with Jack. Unlike the rest of the town's populace, who only scare for fun and are against causing harm, Oogie is ruthless, bitter and a bully about being treated as the local outcast. Ed Ivory as Santa Claus, the ruler of Christmas Town. Santa is responsible for the annual celebration of Christmas, in which he delivers presents to children in the real world. He is additionally referred to by Halloween Town's populace as "Sandy Claws" and provides the brief narration at the start of the film. Joe Ranft as Igor, another creation of Finkelstein who is his lab assistant.
The cast also features Debi Durst, Greg Proops, Kerry Katz, Randy Crenshaw, Sherwood Ball, Carmen Twillie, Thurl Ravenscroft, Glenn Walters and John Morris handling additional character voices. Patrick Stewart recorded Santa Claus' narration for the extended prologue and the epilogue. While not used in the final film, the narration is included on the soundtrack album.
Production Development
As writer Tim Burton's upbringing in Burbank, California, was associated with the feeling of solitude, the filmmaker was largely fascinated by holidays during his childhood. "Anytime there was Christmas or Halloween, [...] it was great. It gave you some sort of texture all of a sudden that wasn't there before," Burton would later recall. After completing his short film Vincent in 1982, Burton, who was then employed at Walt Disney Feature Animation, wrote a three-page poem titled The Nightmare Before Christmas, drawing inspiration from television specials of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, How the Grinch Stole Christmas! and the poem A Visit from St. Nicholas. Burton intended to adapt the poem into a television special with the narration spoken by his favorite actor, Vincent Price, but also considered other options such as a children's book. He created concept art and storyboards for the project in collaboration with Rick Heinrichs, who also sculpted character models;Avins, Mimi (November 1993). "Ghoul World". Premiere: pp. 24–30. Retrieved on September 26, 2008. Burton later showed his and Heinrichs' works-in-progress to Henry Selick, also a Disney animator at the time. After the success of Vincent in 1982, Disney started to consider developing The Nightmare Before Christmas as either a short film or 30-minute holiday television special. However, the project's development eventually stalled, as its tone seemed "too weird" to the company. As Disney was unable to "offer his nocturnal loners enough scope", Burton was fired from the studio in 1984 and went on to direct the commercially successful films Beetlejuice (1988) and Batman (1989) for Warner Bros. Pictures.
Over the years, Burton regularly thought about the project. In 1990, Burton found out that Disney still owned the film rights. He and Selick committed to produce a full-length film expanding on the poem's storyline with the latter as director. Selick chose not to work with MTV for a series based on his short film Slow Bob in the Lower Dimensions to direct this film. Burton's own success with live-action films piqued the interest of Walt Disney Studios chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg, who saw the film as an opportunity to continue the studio's streak of recent successes in feature animation. Disney was looking forward to Nightmare "to show capabilities of technical and storytelling achievements that were present in Who Framed Roger Rabbit." Walt Disney Pictures president David Hoberman believed the film would prove to be a creative achievement for Disney's image, elaborating "we can think outside the envelope. We can do different and unusual things." Nightmare marked Burton's third consecutive film with a Christmas setting. Burton could not direct because of his commitment to Batman Returns (and was also in pre-production on Ed Wood), and he did not want to be involved with "the painstakingly slow process of stop motion". To adapt his poem into a screenplay, Burton approached Michael McDowell, his collaborator on Beetlejuice. McDowell and Burton experienced creative differences, which convinced Burton to make the film as a musical with lyrics and compositions by frequent collaborator Danny Elfman. Elfman and Burton created a rough storyline and two-thirds of the film's songs. Elfman found writing Nightmares eleven songs to be "one of the easiest jobs I've ever had. I had a lot in common with Jack Skellington." Caroline Thompson had yet to be hired to write the screenplay. With Thompson's screenplay, Selick stated, "there are very few lines of dialogue that are Caroline's. She became busy on other films and we were constantly rewriting, re-configuring and developing the film visually." Thompson clashed with Burton and he also destroyed the editing machine after she said she wanted to redraft the film's ending.
Filming