Part of Shocktober
Returning to the painstaking stop-motion animation he employed with amazing success in THE NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS, Tim Burton presents a hair-raising legend based on a 19th-century Russian folktale, in which a young man (Johnny Depp) mistakenly weds a corpse (Helena Bonham Carter) while on a two-day trek to the village of his real bride-to-be (Emily Watson). It’s up to the groom’s flesh-and-blood fiancée — who has been pining for the arrival of her intended — to face her wraith-like rival and make peace with her by promising to live her dreams for her and by vowing to remember her always. Only then are the living bride and groom free to proceed with their own wedding ceremony in this warmhearted, family-friendly fable.
“The story that’s told in CORPSE BRIDE…is affecting in itself, the vitality and beauty of the textures and movement on-screen have a special poignancy. CORPSE BRIDE isn’t the sort of thing you see every day…. A lush, modern valentine to old-fashioned sentiment, and to old-fashioned moviemaking, too.” —Stephanie Zacharek, Salon (Sep 16, 2005) “This may be light family entertainment, but it’s also a pleasingly perverse celebration of Victorian morbidity.” —J.R. Jones, Chicago Reader (Sep 23, 2005)
