CORALINE (2009)
Directed by Henry Selick
Starring the voices of: Dakota Fanning, Terri Hatcher, Ian McShane, Jennifer Saunders, Dawn French
What do you think of when you think of animated films? Do you think of furry little woodland creatures singing bright, sappy songs? Do you think of fairy tales about princesses on their quest for Prince Charming?
Or do you think of giant mechanical spider-witches? Or obese, half-naked former movie divas? Or maybe replicants of your family members with buttons sewn over their eyeballs?
If you prefer the latter to the former, then oh boy, have I got a movie for you.
Let me say this up front: this movie will more than likely scare the ever-loving crap out of your kids. But that’s a good thing, since that’s exactly what it was intended to do. Based on the novel by Neil Gaiman (who is known for his more grown-up horror stories), Coraline tells the story of a young girl (Fanning) who moves to a new town with her neglectful, workaholic parents. The apartment is filled with strange neighbors, but most of them want nothing to do with Coraline. They can’t even get her name right. But one day, while exploring the house, she comes upon a small door that has been covered with wallpaper. By day, it’s bricked up and impassible. But by night, it leads to a wonderful alternate universe where everything is exponentially better than her normal life. Her parents lavish attention on her. Her neighbors are magical, mystical entertainers. Sure, they all look a bit creepy, what with those button sewn over their eyes, but everyone is as happy as can be. Because there’s trouble if anyone shows a noticeable lack of joviality…
The film was done in stop-motion animation by the same director who brought us The Nightmare Before Christmas. But in the years since that first film, technology has progressed quite a bit, adding for several digital assists that add to the movie’s look. And what a look it is. This is one of the best designed films I have ever seen. The filmmakers have created a world where their imaginations were allowed to run rampant. However, there is a great deal of control, as nothing seems out of place. All the visual and conceptual ideas flow into and out of one another.
Coraline is interesting for another reason: it’s essentially a horror film for kids. There’s no blood or guts or sex (except for a bit of comical partial nudity), but there is plenty of “nightmare fuel.” The characters were designed in such a way that they could be pulled out of their usually comical forms and twisted into grotesque figures. Over the course of the film, Coraline must find the eyes of a group of ghost children that the Other Mother (the aforementioned Giant Mechanical Spider Witch) had hidden from them. True, there’s little in the way of violence here, but there’s enough to keep your kids up for a few nights.
The only weak spot with Coraline is the voice acting. True, you’ve got a group of actors who don’t normally work in the voice-over realm, but I’ve got to believe they could have put more effort into it than they did. The exceptions are Saunders and French who play so well off each other that they are the highlight of all the performances. And wait till you see their musical review…
To tell you the truth, I have been waiting for a long time for animated films to break out of the “age ghetto.” This happens all the time in Europe and Asia, where animation is looked at as a respected art form that can handle any genre. Here in the States, it’s strictly kiddy fare. But Coraline doesn’t pull any punches when it comes to intensity, which may upset many parents. And that’s okay. Animation can do whatever we want it to do. For decades, it was used to baby-sit unruly kids. Now people are starting to see the potential the medium has, and are using it to tell stories that couldn’t be told in live-action, regardless of whether somebody’s three-year-old may like it. They’re doing it for the art of it, which is how it should be. This is still filmmaking, after all.
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