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While some of you may have already watched this around Halloween, I prefer my nightmares to happen right around Christmas time. The cult status behind TNBC is undeniable from Hot Topic mall-fronts to 13 year old emo girls toting the backpacks, but there’s a good reason for it.

Tim Burton created a masterful world of imagination and heartfelt emotion and handed it off to the capable directing hands of Henry Selick and had it accented by the musical stylings of Danny Elfman. While the story starts in Halloweentown and focuses on a motley crew of monsters, it is, at its heart, a Christmas story ripe with self-realization and love.

On the surface the film can easily be enjoyed as an interesting stop-motion masterpiece with delightful songs, wonderful set-pieces and an interesting take on Christmas. Delving deeper, you’ll find a wealth of cinematic gold with rich characters and development. Really the story is about the journey one must undertake to accept your own nature. It shows the pratfalls of jumping ship and trying to be something you’re not and begs us all to open our eyes and look to our loved ones for comfort and take note of those around us who truly care. Perfect Christmas time sentiments all.

So for those of you who’ve already watched it around Halloween, come Christmas play it again and watch it with those you care for. If you haven’t seen it, by all means make it happen this year! Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas is a dream come true in cinema and offers a wonderfully refreshing take and a new angle on what it means to love, embrace the Christmas spirit, and find comfort in friends, and more importantly – to find comfort in your own skin.