I appreciate your reply because you actually TRIED to give a valid arguement, unlike everyone else who just shat on me for giving my honest opinion. I genuinely thank you.
Though, I must say I don’t agree with you.
The art style and animation ARE incredibly well done and easily the best parts of the film. Many of the shots admittedly had me spellbound at the creativity behind them. I understand that this film was revolutionary at the time of its release and I can definitely see why people at the time were blown away by what this film presented...at the time. Nowadays, stop motion animated feature films are far more commonplace, and most are better. Caroline and Kubo, fore example, are leagues better than this film because A: they have well written characters, B: they have well written stories, and C: they’re not boring or padded out. Both of those films had great critical reception, but why aren’t they held on the same pedistool as this one? Because there isn’t as much nostalgia for it?
Regardless, many people have pretty much been saying “who cares about the writing? The animation is great!” Yes, true, the animation is more than great. But I’m sorry, the story and writing will ALWAYS come first. Independence Day has amazing CGI, but that doesn’t automatically mean it has an amazing story. A good writer can make simple characters while also adding depth to them. In fact, most movies have simple characters with great depth. And the whole fairy tale defense doesn’t make much sense to me either. Like, I get what you mean because this movie does have that sort of “bedtime story” feel to it, but this isn’t a bedtime story, it’s a feature length film. Regardless, Snow White, Pinocchio, Cinderella, etc all have much better writing than this movie does. In Cinderella, we see why she’s troubled and why she wants more. In this movie, Jack Skellington decides at random that he wants more after already having everything.
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zephyr_cape (2979)
6 years ago
Cool, I'm glad you get that I mean you no harm or insult, despite some heightened rhetorical moves there. : )
I figure the likely reason someone tends to make an "I think this sucks/who agrees" thread, besides the obvious affirmation, is to see how their impressions hold up to counterpoint, so I'm just giving you undiluted feedback in the terms of your OP.
So anywhom, I don't expect I'll change your mind on this (and that's fine) primarily because of this statement:
But I’m sorry, the story and writing will ALWAYS come first.
...But I'll give you my two cents.
This is something I've been addressing a lot lately here in regard to movies that are in some way unconventional, because it's something I'd like to see more people shift their thinking on. And that is that not all films are created equal, and the same "rules" and parameters don't apply universally. Generally when you take a sampling of the kinds of critical comments a casual audience makes in regard to, say for instance, a movie that is more or less abstract, you'll see that many of those who hated it will cite reasons that are outside of the framework of what that movie is actually dealing with. I submit to you that any film, and any work of art, necessarily choses a focus and self-assigns or invents through the sum of its decisions what its own rules and parameters are, and that it's within a film's prerogative to operate in relation to or irrespective of whatever parameters suit it. By extension, no film can ever emphasize or necessarily deal at all with every aspect of what film can encompass and there will always be some areas of possibility left blank. Then, any sort of legitimate analysis or critique would be sensitive to what is within that boundary and what isn't relevant.
(cont'd...)
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zephyr_cape (2979)
6 years ago
(pt.2)
I submit to you that, though storytelling and writing will always be at the top of what you're personally looking for in a movie, in some cases that may be a genuinely inappropriate framework for approaching a particular work. There will be cases where the film's priorities are out of order with your own, or perhaps completely unfamiliar. The more elastic you can be in your outlook on what a movie is, should be, can be, in part by being aware when it happens that you're reacting according to a preconception you have that may be misplaced, the wider your capacity to appreciate different sorts of viewpoints on what films can be, and the more aptly you'll be able to analyze them and get something more out of them.
Nightmare tells a rather simple story if you're looking at the bullet points on paper. Everything in it is an archetype. The characters are fleshed out more through the performances, their movement, their visual presentation, and acting/singing than the sum of their written beats. Compare it to the opera of Eugene Onegin. There is similarly a simple story, with many plot points and characterizations submitted as taken for granted and motivations given little explicit explanation, but the specificity of the words and music and their performance sweeps the minimal archetypal content up into a lavish emotional living thing, where what is not spelled out becomes space for your imagination to fill in the details and create a very personal impression.
(cont'd...)
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zephyr_cape (2979)
6 years ago
(pt.3)
The writing is no more and no less than it needs to be, and I'd argue that the specifics of the plot exist to support the phenomenological experience, and not the other way around as is more common in movies.
"In this movie, Jack Skellington decides at random that he wants more after already having everything."
^ In this example, right from the outset, Jack has been bored of his position as pumpkin king for some amount of time. He's at a point in his life where, though he would appear to have an enviable status (lol), he no longer finds any meaning in the routine. There's an inkling in him that there's something more to life, or something new that would bring him some sense of meaning out there but doesn't know yet what it is. That's the motivation right there. What more needs to be explained? The less detail given to this, the more there is space for us to fill in our personal experience. Who hasn't been there?
(cont'd...)
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zephyr_cape (2979)
6 years ago
(pt.4)
"I can definitely see why people at the time were blown away by what this film presented...at the time. Nowadays, stop motion animated feature films are far more commonplace, and most are better."
^ I can totally understand this film not being to someone's personal taste for any number of reasons. There's no accounting for taste. But I'd like to encourage using some restraint in a value judgement in a case like this. I think, even if all you're able to see in this is the aesthetic value as superficial, it deserves enough respect to forego evaluating it as "terrible" owing to the uncertainty that you're judging it by applicable criteria, and very significantly that it is a pioneering achievement in film history that literally created the platform for an entire category of feature film animation that has thrived in the years since. It's not just about nostalgia. Nightmare invented the game, invented the processes and proved to the industry at large that this type of work was possible and viable. I can't stress enough how huge that is. In my opinion it's significant to the point that an individual opinion on the film according to whims of taste is meaningless in the same way that anger does not touch the mind of Buddha. One can't dismiss it for being merely a moment in time. Things build on the shoulders of what came before and it's because of what came before that "better" possibilities become available. Compared to the immensity of what Nightmare accomplished, Coraline and Kubo, though fantastic and grandiose in their own ways, are tiny little toots on the overarching map.
(cont'd...)
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zephyr_cape (2979)
6 years ago
(pt.5)
I love Coraline and Kubo, but for me Nightmare is still superior, yes for its historic importance and cultural impact as well as boldness of uncompromising vision, and according to reasons of personal taste which is a whole other can of worms that I'm running out of steam to get into at the moment. Just to hint at one of my main issues, I'll say that I believe stop-motion has become over-refined and has lost much of what was at a level of peak-charm on Nightmare. Let's call it a post for now.
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