Paranorman (2012) Review

Paranorman (2012) Review

 

After the studio LAIKA’s considerable success with their stop motion adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s children’s story Coraline, they created Paranorman, which leaned even more into the spooky appeal that had helped Coraline gain recognition from audiences of all ages. Even though Paranorman is an original idea and was successful with critics as well as at the box office, it isn’t as well remembered or talked about as much today as Coraline, and maybe that’s partly because Coraline is something you could watch any time of year, whereas Paranorman feels distinctly made to be watched around Halloween, despite not being set in October.

Norman Babcock can talk to ghosts, and we get a fun little example of his ability and how it affects his life before the opening title. It’s not a secret that he’s able to do this, but no one really believes him, so he’s bullied at school and doesn’t have any friends, until one day he hangs out with Neil, a fat ginger kid who also has no friends, but Norman helps him reconnect with his dead dog and they hit it off. Norman’s school doesn’t follow the regular curriculum, because all they teach the kids about is the town's witch trial from centuries ago, and they even re-enact it with a school play, but Norman soon learns from his crazy estranged great-uncle Mr. Prenderghast that the witch put a curse on the town, and Prenderghast can see dead people too. Norman’s ability makes him the one destined to protect the townsfolk from the witch’s curse after Prenderghast passes on, and the curse will make the seven people who committed the witch to death return as zombies and descend on the town.

Paranorman was made to please adult horror fans taking their kids to a family film, and it was made to turn young viewers into horror lovers. I think it’s actually darker and scarier than Coraline, but not really that comparable in terms of what makes it scary. Visually, it’s fantastic, but somehow not quite as stunning as Coraline, either, with more computer-generated effects overlaid with the stop motion. It was one of the first movies of its kind to be released in 3D, and many of the shots clearly demonstrate an intent to have things coming out of the screen. Unfortunately, that effect is lost in the 2D home video version, so does nothing to enhance the viewing experience anymore. The character designs are charming and the way so many little parts of the setting or props are crooked or askew adds a subliminal layer of joyful fright. The best part is the group of zombies. Instead of having an endless horde of generic ones, we get a good look at all seven, and they are all unique, capable of being creepy or funny or even both in the same scene.

My biggest problem with Paranorman, believe it or not, is Norman himself. The kid is such a sad sack, and I know he’s supposed to be a sympathetic protagonist and being able to see and speak to the dead is a weird ability that makes him an outcast, but he’s so down about it for the first half of the movie and then when he needs to save the day he’s still ridiculed by pretty much everyone, and it’s too late into the movie that he finally starts becoming more interesting and sympathetic. The supporting characters are mixed, with some being more likable than others. There’s a bully who looks kind of gross and is incredibly dumb, and he’s supposed to be an antagonist to Norman, so it works, but then they do the trope of the bully and the victim working together and reconciling at the end, which is fine, except it means the bully is around more in the latter half of the movie, and I would have preferred if he hadn’t been. Norman’s sister starts out purposefully annoying but becomes more likable later on, as well as funnier, when she starts trying to hit on Neil’s clueless older brother. 

Paranorman carries a sense of fun in its scariness, and for that reason I think it’s perfect to watch with the whole family around Halloween. Some of the jokes are very amateur and about things like diarrhea, but many jokes and references are very adult, and the range of humour combined with explicit references to the damnation of hell and some other more mature ideas make it something that would probably entertain kids from 8-12 the most, but I caution against it for kids younger than that.