WITH very few exceptions, films described as "holiday classics" tend to be toe-curlingly saccharine affairs. Not so this brilliantly dark, stop-motion musical fantasy from the splendidly twisted imagination of Tim Burton. Since its rather half-hearted initial release in 1993, word of mouth has given The Nightmare Before Christmas the status of genuine family classic - especially if that family happens to be named Addams! But for many years, watching it on DVD has been virtually the only opportunity to experience this frightfully fun story tale of how Jack Skellington (voiced by Chris Sarandon), the bored Pumpkin King of Halloweentown, attempts to take over the festive Christmas season for a change of pace, and ends up kidnapping Santa Claus. This is a tale with real heart and full of characters, like Jack Skellington and the lonely rag doll Sally (Catherine O'Hara) who are, ironically enough, much more compelling and engaging than the vast majority of the human actors one sees on screen these days! Now Disney, the very same folk who displayed so little faith in the project in the first place, have used the latest 3-D technology to bring this unique film back to the big screen where it belongs and seeing it this way is a thrilling experience that shouldn't be missed. Understandably, Burton and the film's director Henry Selick were initially nervous about turning an analogue film into a new digital print. "I was concerned that it would be a kind of Frankenstein's monster," Selick remembers. But what's wonderful about this dazzling new version of an already beloved film is that, as Burton says, "because of the 3-D process, audiences really get to see the texture of the puppets! When we were making the movie, we got to feel in our hearts like our characters were real. When you see it in 3-D, it just takes it that much further. "Everything comes to life and you can literally see through the eye-sockets of Jack Skellington! I'm extremely happy that the movie has kept its purity and the 3-D actually adds much more to it." He's completely right, and what more do you need to know?