Les Noces funèbres

After enchanting audiences with "The Nightmare Before Christmas," Tim Burton brings another stop-motion animated spectacle, "Corpse Bride." In this story, Victor Van Dort, an inept young groom-to-be, can't make his way through his wedding rehearsal. Going outside to get his lines right, he accidentally winds up marrying the corpse of a murdered bride-to-be. The animation is spectacular, proving stop-motion can be good enough to compete with computer animation. Johnny Depp provides the voice of Victor, showing mild-mannered and nervous grace. Helena Bonham Carter is the voice of Emily, the Corpse Bride, giving the dead character lively emotion. One striking element of the movie is the color scheme. In the living world, there is no bright color, making a near-black and white appearance. The story is well-written, and the music is good. Overall, "Corpse Bride" must definitely be seen!

This is not my favourite Tim Burton movie by a long shot, but I did find myself enjoying it. The animation is absolutely amazing with the dark bold colours and inspired visual ideas. The music is good too, it adds very well to the atmosphere. The four songs are pretty decent, if nothing special. Remains of the Day was the one I liked best. The script is witty and deliciously dark in places, while the story is clever and fairly original, even if it drags slightly occasionally. The characters are wonderfully quirky and the voice work from the likes of Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter is top notch. All in all, a beautifully crafted film, if not quite Burton's finest hour. 8/10 Bethany Cox

Tim Burton's Corpse Bride was one of the best animated movies I've ever seen. My mother and I are so happy that he made another beautiful and original animated film since The Nightmare Beofre Christmas because we waited for it for 10 years. I'm glad to say that the wait was worth it. The Corpse Bride is a wonderful emotional yet fun story with heart. We had a wonderful time watching it in the theaters and we can't wait to go see it again this weekend. The visuals are so amazing that you'd have to go see the movie with your own eyes for its impossible to explain there perfection. The characters all look stunning and there are so many wonderful new characters in this movie that will keep your eyes glued on the screen. The voices of Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter and Emily Watson are packed with fantastic emotion and acting. The score goes very well to the movie and the four songs that are performed sound wonderful. My favorites were "Remains of the Day" made me feel like dancing: it was such a jazzy fun song with the cool voice of Danny Elfmen. And my other favorite was "Tears To Shed" it broke my heart. Helena Bonham Carter sang that song with such heartbreak I loved it! The story is very entertaining and it has so much heart in it and Gothic like background. I loved the dialog some of my favorite lines were "Why Go Up There When People Are Dying To Get Down Here" and "Can A Heart Still Break Once It's Stopped Beating." But the most important thing is that this movie makes you feel less frightened about death. Death in this movie is a lot funner than living and the dead are always having a good time and partying that you feel like dying is not so bad. You should take anyone to see this movie if their paranoid about death it will soften their fears, Overall I strongly encourage anyone to go see this movie. I hope Tim Burten wins the Oscar for best animated movie this year. He truly deserves it! Thank you Mr. Burten for the Corpse Bride, Nightmare Before Christmas and years worth of your great films.

People say that Corpse Bride was horribly boring, etc. HOWEVER, that is because they are comparing this nonstop motion picture with Nightmare Before Christmas. Those who were really upset after the movie, saying that 'it's definitely not Nightmare', you are absolutely right. It is not Nightmare. It's Corpse Bride, a completely different movie. Everything was comparison, Nightmare to Corpse Bride, and yes, I'll admit, I enjoyed Nightmare more. However, when going to see this movie, you cannot compare Corpse Bride to Nightmare because then yes, you will be upset. If they had done another Nightmare, they would have done it years ago. But this is a different movie with a beautiful plot when you think more closely about it. It's a very strong plot of love, betrayal, hate, death, etc and you see that very strongly if you listen closely to Danny Elfman's wonderful music, vocal and instrumental. Basically, go into the theaters with an open mind and enjoy and pay attention to the movie because it truly has strong, very strong, meanings. If truly watching and comprehending, at parts you cry and at others you smile. It's very clear that it is beautifully created and the actors match their parts well, but the storyline is simply beautiful. Do not think about Nightmare because that movie has been finished years ago, but enjoy Corpse Bride. I will not give anything away, so I leave my review at that. Enjoy Corpse Bride people! And for others who think I am Anti-Nightmare or something, I am seriously not. I loved and still love that movie, but just enjoy Corpse Bride without judgement until after the movie.

Victor Van Dort (Johnny Depp) is supposed to marry Victoria Everglot. Both sets of parents are in favor of this arranged marriage, as the Van Dorts have money but are not part of high society and the Everglots have noble blood but are dirt poor. However, at the rehearsal, Victor screws everything up and he's sent off to try to memorize the wedding vows...which he keeps screwing up. While walking through the woods and practicing, he finally gets it right and ends up married to a corpse who has just come back to life after he put the ring on her skeletal finger! What is poor Victor to do? After all, life in the underworld with a skeletal wife isn't most folks' idea of a great marriage!

The animation is pretty spectacular...though the Laika stop-motion films are a bit prettier and are more fluid...though for 2005 this is awfully good. It's also interesting how they used colors in the story. The world of the living is all in gray tones...whereas the underworld is very vividly colored...quite the opposite of what you probably expected.

As for the story, it's very nice. My only complaints about any of this is that the story is perhaps too simple and the music isn't at all memorable (unlike Tim Burton's more famous stop-motion predecessor, "The Nightmare Before Christmas"). But the visuals are amazing and the story is fun.

By the way, I would NOT recommend it to small kids. The story about death is awfully creepy and this is more a film for older kids and adults.