A first time watch, and a nostalgic revisit for the missus, its been 20 years since ‘Corpse Bride’ released and gained quite a fan following, at the time this film came out my affection for Tim Burton as a film maker was somewhat on the wane. As a director I think his best years to date run from ‘Frankenweinie’ in 1984 right the way through to probably Sleepy Hollow or his attempted reboot of ‘Planet of the Apes’. but by the early 2000’s it felt like a director just going through the motions. ‘Charlie and the chocolate factory’ to me had a few sparkles in it, but there was a creaking sense of self plagerism creeping into his work and style…and when ‘Corpse Bride’ hit the scene, I offhandedly wrote it off as his attempt to essentially recreate ‘A Nightmare Before Christmas’ so that he could finally have something approximating it to put his own name on given the controversy around his involvement in that film and Henry Selick.

Watching it now, I dont think I was really that far off the mark, but thats not to say that there wasnt fun to be had with this.

Clocking in at a breezy hour and 17 minutes, the plot follows Victor, a nervous ‘groom to be’ in an arranged marriage to Victoria. Victors parents want the marriage to elevate them into aristocricy by proxy, and Victorias parents want the marriage because, while they retain their titles, the last of their wealth is tied up into assets, and should the wedding not go ahead as planned, it could lead to a mass sell off to pay their debts rendering them homeless and penniless to boot.

Neither Victor or Victoria have met prior to this arrangement, and the first time they do meet is mere minutes before the wedding rehersal…and they really hit it off! Unfortunatley Victor is VERY nervous and clumsy and is unable to properly complete the wedding ceremony without messing things up.

So the night before the wedding, while out in a walk in the woods, Victor practices and eventually manages to complete the ceremony, using what he thinks is an old tree branch to mimic his bride to be’s hand. Unfortunately, it turns out that this is no tree branch, its the skeletal and fossilized arm of Emily. A jilted bride who was murdered under mysterious circumstances. Victors vows has briefly ressurected her, and she assumes Victor is her Groom to be, so; she accepts his vows and the pair are wed.

But that leaves a problem, as Victoria is still to be married, and a member of the local village witnesses Victor on a bridge with a young lady, creating a rumour that he’s eloped and jilted Victoria. Enter ‘Lord Barkis’ a seemingly wealthy aristocrat, who’s heard of Victoria and her wealthy family, who begins to worm his way in with Victorias parents, eventually convincing them that HE may be a suitable replacement for Victor. Meanwhile; Victor tries to strike a balance of explaining to Emily that they cannot be wed, while also trying to keep her on side as shes really quite suffered enough.

With this being a studio stop motion production with a very distinct director at the healm, I wasnt too worried about the technical skills of this production. Its quite derivitive of ‘Nightmare before Christmas’ and in my opinion, while its technically aiming to be more impressive than it, ‘Nightmare’ for my money delivers a much more complex and intricate time. But across the board on a technical level, this is a really decently handled, if not *slightly* stale production. the colours all pop, selective use of desaturation is nice, the actual direction and animation compositions are delightful and engaging…

The cast is star studded and equally superb, It was delightful to hear Christopher Lee in a latter day role still brining a fantastic range to proceedings, and Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Richard E. Grant, Albert Finney and Michael Gaugh all delight with animated and vibrant performances that are largely engaging, with maybe just a hint of dryness creeping in in places.

The score itself is pretty decent, with Danny Elfman bringing more of his thing to this, though I will say some of the songs arnt quite as notable or memorable as his previous offerings up to this point, and some of the musical numbers do go on for a fair bit longer than I would have liked.

But really; its the script thats probably this films biggest problem, its a film that takes a good while to really get properly going, with the aforementioned musical numbers acting as a heavy barrier between the narrative and some kind of audience pay off. There are multiple moments in this film where the plot will JUST start to flare up, and then we’re met with a 3-5 minute uninspiring musical number that grinds everything back to a halt till they’re done.

The film sags a little in the back end of the first act and opening of the 2nd, and while the humour is good for the most part, there are moments that feel a bit lax on quality control. and theres a fair bit of idling for time in the back half of this to get it up to a releasable ‘feature’ runtime.

The pacing and act strucuturing is pretty nippy, but those padded moments dotted throughout, with the musical numbers, really do stop this from being the best that it could possibly be.

Tonally; it feels like it wants to try and capture the emotional resonance of ‘Nightmare’ and as a result comes across whiffing of ‘We have Nightmare before Christmas at home.’ Again, its not an inherently bad thing. and I did enjoy some of the jokes across this films runtime. But…yeah, it feels a little phoned in.

Ultimately; ‘Corpse Bride’ to me? isnt an essential watch, but it IS a film that I would be more than happy to sit through again. For a latter day Tim Burton offering, its probably the last film i’ve seen him make that actually held up. and i’d say if you did enjoy his 90s work, this one may be worth a spin.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/corpse-bride/