The Nightmare Before Christmas

The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) is a Henry Selick stop-action animated musical film about the inhabitants of Halloween Town who take over Christmas one year.

Synopsis

The Nightmare Before Christmas takes place in a world in which all holidays are created and organized by the inhabitants of different towns. There is a Halloween town, a Christmas town, an Easter town and so on.

Related Topics:
Holiday - Halloween - Christmas - Easter

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:Halloweentown, with that spelling, is a setting in the Halloweentown series of movies.

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The story follows the adventures of Jack Skellington, the "Pumpkin King" of Halloween Town, where the residents annually prepare Halloween for the mortal world. Jack suffers from depression as a result of having to prepare the same holiday year after year, and longs for something else. This "something else" takes the form of Christmas, which he discovers in Christmas Town while wandering in the woods. Upon entering Christmas Town he is immediately enlivened, and longs to "have" Christmas for himself.

Related Topics:
Halloween - Christmas

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Jack convinces the other residents of Halloween Town to "make Christmas," but they don't understand the holiday and create all sorts of monsterous toys to scare children. Sally, Jack's admirer, has a premonition and feels a sense of forboding, thus, attempts to dissuade Jack from his plan. Jack, however, ignores her, and has Santa Claus kidnapped so that he might take his place on December 25th. On Christmas, Jack wreaks havoc all over the world, blissfully unaware of how terribly wrong his version of Christmas cheer is. Eventually his sleigh is shot out of the sky by the US military, which prompts a moment of reflection. Realizing the horror he has unleashed, in the end he manages to return to Halloween Town in time to free Santa Claus and set things right. A sub plot involves the capture and torture of Santa Claus at the hands of the mysterious Oogie Boogie.

Related Topics:
Santa Claus - Oogie Boogie

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Skellington appeared again in the 1996 film James and the Giant Peach, as a skeletal underwater pirate.

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