Recently Watched: The Nightmare Before Christmas

[ellyssian]

The Nightmare Before Christmas (Special Edition)

I realized, as I sat watching this with Justin, that this movie - like a handful of others - will always have an additional special meaning to me.

First off, I love Tim Burton's stuff. His imagery, when you get to the essence of it, is always somewhere between Halloween and Christmas. Think of Edward Scissorhands, with the dark and eerie appearance, but with Edward's deep and loving innocence at its heart, or his second Batman film, with the Dark Knight lit with the bright lights of Christmas. However he may use that imagery in other movies, this movie, which starts on Halloween and ends on Christmas, is that imagery.

Danny Elfman, as a composer, also lives in that same realm, which is one of the reasons that the two work together so often. One of my favorite directors, and one of my favorite composers.

The story here is also great; simple, perhaps, but perfectly fitted to the whole of the work. The stop-motion animation brings back memories, as the narrator says at the opening, of those holiday worlds of old.

For me, though, what I will always remember is watching it with Justin about 10 years ago. I had just moved to Pennsylvania, and that move ended immediately in an split from Deb. I absolutely hated seeing Justin only on weekends - but I treasured that time spent, and it is really the only thing I remember much about from those months.

Like this movie, the separation spanned from (a month or two before) Halloween to (a couple weeks after) Christmas. I had no car, so a friend from work drove me to the mall to get Justin presents. A big yellow dump truck was the main toy - and, as it was a very tiny apartment, the truck carried a 3' tall tree in it.

I remember watching certain movies with Justin when he'd come over - this one and A Muppet Christmas Carol in particular - and I will forever identify them with a feeling that was a mixture of pain and pleasure, sorrow and heart-warming. Something kind of like the contrast between Halloween and Christmas.