The Nightmare Before Christmas

The Nightmare Before Christmas (also known as Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas) is a 1993 American stop-motion animated musical dark fantasy film directed by Henry Selick in his feature directorial debut and produced and conceived by Tim Burton. It tells the story of Jack Skellington, the King of "Halloween Town", who stumbles upon "Christmas Town" and schemes to take over the holiday. Danny Elfman wrote the songs and score and provided the singing voice of Jack. The principal voice cast includes Chris Sarandon, Catherine O'Hara, William Hickey, Ken Page, Paul Reubens, Glenn Shadix, and Ed Ivory. The Nightmare Before Christmas originated from a poem written by 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 film 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 Walt Disney Studios. Production started in July 1991 in San Francisco; Disney initially released the film through Touchstone Pictures because the studio believed the film 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 its wide theatrical release on October 29. The film was met with critical success upon release, earning praise for its animation, particularly the innovation of stop-motion as an art form, as well as its characters, songs, and score. While initially a modest box office hit, it has since garnered a large cult following and is widely regarded as one of the greatest animated films of all time. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects, a first for an animated film, but lost to Jurassic Park. The film has been reissued by Walt Disney Pictures and was re-released annually in Disney Digital 3-D from 2006 until 2010. Plot Halloween Town is a fantasy world populated by various monsters and beings associated with the holiday ("This is Halloween"). Jack Skellington, who is respected by the citizens as the "Pumpkin King", leads them in organizing the annual Halloween celebrations, but he has grown tired of the same annual routine and wants something new ("Jack's Lament").