When you walk into the theater where Coraline is playing, the first thing that you'll probably notice is that there are plenty of kids around you. When the movie starts playing, the second thing you'll probably notice is that this movie wasn't made for kids.
Of course, that shouldn't shock you since Coraline is adapted from a novella by Neil Gaiman, the type of writer who allows characters from The Chronicles of Narnia to think about penises in his stories. Nor is there anything wrong with PG-rated movies not being designed for kids; with all of the grotesque humor in Coraline, you'll be surprised at how many parents don't end up dragging their children out of the theater.
Easily relatable to Alice in Wonderland, the film follows its eponymous tweenage protagonist as she finds a secret door in her new home that leads to an Other universe where everything and everyone lives life on a metaphorical happy-happy rainbow-colored pot of gold. Her Other mother and Other father, who have buttons for eyes, make her the best of meals and buy her the most playful of pets. It's extra fulfilling because Coraline hasn't been getting along with life in her new home: her perpetually typing, real father begs her to go away and explore the house; her real mother won't buy her the cute new little gloves that she wants.
Reread that last line-yes, Coraline is a brat. And a predictable struggle appears when it turns out this Other world is not as delightwful as it seems, and Coraline must choose between her brattiness and her love for her family.
Coraline's brattiness is occasionally grating, but we're bound to have conflicting feelings about it, because she's also clever and witty. Writer-director Henry Selick's script, which borrows liberally from his source material, graciously avoids the cheap dialogue that pervades lesser animated films such as Ice Age 2.
But even with its humor, Coraline's best quality is its visuals, making the most of the claymation medium. The ambiance of a sequence where she walks into a garden that her Other father has been working on, complemented by jazz music and vibrant colors, is sure to run through your bones for hours afterward.
With the visuals being top-notch, it's too bad that the story falls a bit short. Coraline lacks the thematic intricacies of its contemporaries (particularly Ratatouille and Wall-E), choosing a simple, familiar message over something provocative and novel (you've probably guessed that it has something to do with not being a selfish brat). Even its pacing is occasionally a trifle off-after a thoroughly warming an0d legitimately creepy climax, the script decides to tack on a second climax that can't top what came before. In other words, you'll probably only watch it once over the course of your entire life.
But one can't stress enough how downright pleasing the sights and quirky script are-having helmed The Nightmare Before Christmas prior, Selick is certainly skilled at handling this medium. It's encouraging to think of what he could produce in the future if armed with a script better sewn.
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