Monday, October 31, 2005

Halloween Countdown Finale

The Top Ten Movies That Make Me Think of Halloween...Concludes!
01. The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)
With an affectionate "BOO!" to the entire filmography of Tim Burton

Who better to be considered the cinematic patron saint of Halloween than that weird, wild-haired auteur Tim Burton? Most of his filmography from his debut featurePee Wee's Big Adventure(1985), to the amazing run of Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, and Batman through to Ed Wood, Mars Attacks! and this year's Corpse Bride displays a sweet magical combo of the macabre and innocent spiced with dark humor and mighty visual invention. In other words, it's easy to love Tim Burton's movies for the exact same reasons that it's easy to enjoy Halloween.

In this Henry Selick directed Tim Burton produced animated adventure all of these auteurial character quirks were literalized into the perfect Halloween movie. Oh, sure...Nightmare's storyline is actually about a longing for Christmas. But from its hilarious and jokily gruesome opening number "This is Halloween" to its triumphant 'let's put on a show' reaffirmations of purpose, this movie subverts all the Christmas love into an ode to Halloween as the supreme holiday for those with ghoulishly creative minds. That twist is this movies most memorable trick. The Nightmare Before Christmas is a sickly delicious treat.

"Boys and girls of every age
Wouldn't you like to see something strange?
Come with us and you will see
This, our town of Halloween
This is Halloween, this is Halloween
Pumpkins scream in the dead of night
This is Halloween, everybody make a scene
Trick or treat till the neighbors gonna die of fright
It's our town, everybody scream
In this town of Halloween."


HAPPY HALLOWEEN

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Shoutout to Danny Elfman, who's brilliant songs were ignored by the academy that year (though, to give them some credit, the winner "Streets of Philadelphia" is among the best).

Anonymous said...

Great movie.

Anonymous said...

"Streets if Philadelphia" is probably one of my top 5 favourite songs of all time. Bruce is a legend.

ANYWAY.

Great choice. Love that movie! And I'm looking forward to The Corpse Bride when it finally gets released here.

-Glenn

Anonymous said...

I hate spammongers.

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Anonymous said...

It's beginning to look like Christmas (Ok, So we're barely over Halloween)! But it's time to be begging to think a lot like christmas movie shopping , : - )

Anonymous said...

A typical dictionary definition of hypnosis states that it is: a state that resembles sleep but that is induced by suggestion. However, anyone who has tried hypnosis (and any self respecting hypnotist) will tell you that this is a very simplistic view of the subject!
A much better description comes from the Free Online Dictionary which states that hypnosis is: an artificially induced state of consciousness, characterised by heightened suggestibility and receptivity to direction. So what does this mean and how can it be used to your advantage?

Well, the subject of hypnosis has been discussed and pondered since the late 1700s. Many explanations and theories have come and gone though science, however, has yet to supply a valid and well-established definition of how it actually happens. It's fairly unlikely that the scientific community will arrive at a definitive explanation for hypnosis in the near future either, as the untapped resources of our 'mostly' uncharted mind still remain something of a mystery.
However, the general characteristics of hypnosis are well documented. It is a trance state characterized by extreme suggestibility, deep relaxation and heightened imaginative functioning. It's not really like sleep at all, because the subject is alert the whole time. It is most often compared to daydreaming, or the feeling you get when you watch a movie or read a captivating book. You are fully conscious, but you tune out most of the outside world. Your focus is concentrated intensely on the mental processes you are experiencing - if movies didn't provide such disassociation with everyday life and put a person in a very receptive state then they would not be as popular (nor would TV advertising be as effective!). Have you ever stated that a film wasn't great because you just couldn't 'get into it'???
This works very simply; while daydream or watching a movie, an imaginary world becomes almost real to you because it fully engages your emotional responses. Such mental pursuits will on most occasions cause real emotional responses such as fear, sadness or happiness (have you ever cried at a sad movie, felt excited by a future event not yet taken place or shivered at the thought of your worst fear?).
It is widely accepted that these states are all forms of self-hypnosis. If you take this view you can easily see that you go into and out of mild hypnotic states on a daily basis - when driving home from work, washing the dishes, or even listening to a boring conversation. Although these situations produce a mental state that is very receptive to suggestion the most powerful time for self-change occurs in the trance state brought on by intentional relaxation and focusing exercises. This deep hypnosis is often compared to the relaxed mental state between wakefulness and sleep.
In this mental state, people feel uninhibited and relaxed and they release all worries and doubts that normally occupy their mind. A similar experience occurs while you are daydreaming or watching the TV. You become so involved in the onscreen antics

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