NIghtmare before christmas: is it really a halloween movie?

By: Ella Boardman-Wolfe

As we near the end of the year, the holiday season is upon us again. With celebrations like Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas, it’s finally time to turn on our favorite seasonal movies. We all have our personal favorites that we return to each year for a comfort-watch to get in the spirit of the season- Hocus Pocus, Elf -you know the drill. One of my personal favorites is Tim Burton’s “The Nightmare Before Christmas.” However, I feel like there’s some controversy regarding which holiday category the movie really falls under. Is it Halloween? Is it Christmas? Is it just a general holiday movie? You see, I love to watch this movie before Halloween, so  perhaps I qualify it as a Halloween movie. But I believe the best scene in the movie is the Christmas scene. In this scene, Jack Skellington falls into Christmas Town and sings the classic song, “What’s This?”. So do I count it based on when I watch it or my favorite scene of the movie? In the beginning of the movie, there is a door for each holiday, so is the movie supposed to be for all celebrations? To help me get some ideas on how to make this decision I went to the public. As expected, there were some mixed results. 

Some went the more typical route as I mentioned before: it’s a Halloween movie. You watch it during that time of year because of the spooky underlying tones. The characters live in a place called ‘Halloween Town’ which may speak for itself. This is definitely an understandable opinion. It’s simple and logistical. 

A more interesting opinion that I wasn’t quite expecting to hear was that it’s a Thanksgiving movie. Why decide between Halloween and Christmas when there’s a holiday in the middle you can stick it under? One way to justify this decision would be that it shows Thanksgiving on one of the trees in the forest. However, I don’t think it’s quite justifiable enough as the holiday isn’t mentioned throughout the rest of the show. It is a nice easy way out though. 

Then there was the statement that it is a Christmas movie. Some had the same reasoning as mine, explaining it’s because of the famous scene in Christmas Town. Others reasoned that it was simply a feeling they got. These two ideas could go hand-in-hand. The feeling people get from the Christmas scene might be what resonates with me the most after watching. Jack Skellington’s amazement with Christmas is what brings the magic of the holiday to the screen. 

Going along with the Thanksgiving idea, perhaps we should just accept it’s both a Halloween and Christmas movie. Why can’t it fall under two categories? Why does it have to be one or the other? Can the show defy categorization and be labeled as a general holiday movie? You can watch it anytime to get in the mood for the holidays. I feel pretty mixed about this one. On one hand it’s an easy solution, but on the other hand holiday movies always classify as one holiday. 

After hearing from the public and sitting with my own thoughts, it’s time to come to a decision. I would really like to go with the easy way out and just call it Thanksgiving, but I just can’t bring myself to that conclusion. I think I’m going to have to stick with my original choice of it being a Halloween movie. I watch it during Halloween, the majority of the movie is in Halloween Town, and the main character (and my favorite) is named Jack Skellington. I could go with the overall holiday idea but once Halloween is over I don’t really want to watch a movie that has anything to do with that holiday. I’m just lucky enough for it to have a really great Christmas scene in it.

• halloween
• halloween movies