Coraline 3D

February 23, 2009

3D isn't what it once was, that is, a gimmick to get a struggling movie business back on track with characters jabbing scissors at you for a cheap thrill; now it's become a tool for ambitious animation directors, like Henry Selick, the stop-motion master behind this wonderfully creepy gem, to create images and places that come alive with depth and a tremendous use of space without sacrificing story or characterization. Adapted from a prize-winning work of prose fantasy by comic-book genius Neil Gaiman, the film tells of a lonely 10-year-old girl (Dakota Fanning) who, living in a rundown Gothic country mansion with her too busy parents, discovers a portal to another dimension in her room, a dimension that presents an alternate lifestyle where the food is good, her parents appreciate her, and the flowers in the garden are planted in her likeness. The catch, it's totally evil, as suggested by the buttons sewed into each character's eye sockets, and the more our Coraline ventures into this once dreamlike abyss, the more distanced and seemingly impossible it becomes for her to find her way back to her real parents. That of course is the film's best lesson for pre-adolescent children, and parents alike, that growing up is hard, but there's no easy escape to a world where it will be better, and if there were, it would probably be paved with bad intentions and misrepresented feelings. Amidst this terrific story and realistic characters is Selick's gorgeous stop-motion animation, which uses the 3D format to create a depth of field that is never less than imaginative and practical (Coraline's portal to her other-universe looks like a long, jagged, paper mache, purple hued laundry chute), filled with characters reminiscent of his great “The Nightmare Before Christmas”, but aimed less for horror and more as a child's fantasy gone terribly wrong.

By Adam Suraf

asuraf@DunkirkMA.net