Coraline was not one of those movies, it just so happened I never go the chance to see it – Now i regret not seeing it in the cinemas.

Coraline is one of those movies which are so freakishly cute animations that you just know they’re not actually made for kids. I may be biased, but to me stop-motion technology has always seemed to produce scary movies for me, there’s just something about clay and other materials coming to life in a series of billions of frames which really seems to creep me out – but from the opening scene of Coraline you realize that your six-year-old sister is going to have nightmares for years, and you also ask yourself ‘did Tim Burton change his name to Henry Selick by any chance?’ With a creepy opening sequence of metallic needle-like hands pulling apart and subsequently sewing back-together a rag doll, you would really ponder the likelihood of the above question.

But if you didn’t know, Selick and Burton may not be the same person, but he was however part of the genius behind the other movie you may be thinking of – The Nightmare Before Christmas. In The Nightmare Before Christmas, Selick worked alongside Burton, but with Coraline Selick flaunted his directional abilities and proves that he doesn’t need Burton’s help to create one hellova creepy animation.

Coraline is apparently based on a book. And as with many movies which are based upon books these days, I had absolutely no idea it existed – But, apparently, everybody else knew about the existence of this tasty Hazelnut Novella, as it has won more awards than i can count with two fingers (it’d be too much effort to name what awards and the amount of them, as that’d mean i’d have to do some research.)

To put it simply, Coraline can be compared to as two other movies that I can think of at this time of the night, Alice in Wonderland, and The Nightmare Before Christmas (maybe even MirrorMask..) The most obvious comparison would have to be with Alice in Wonderland, as Coroline follows some drugged up rat into a hole where most of the movie is located, there’s a cat which gives you the creeps, some people you don’t know whether you can trust, and a Queen (or robot/monster/witch/whatever) which rules the entire alternate universe.

Good: Cute, yet scary. Great storyline, Dakota Fanning.
Bad: Sometimes too creepy for the PG rating, almost like a Tim Burton drug trip.
Overall: In all the movie is almost like somebody ate Alice in Wonderland with a side of Nightmare Before Christmas, took some Acid, vomited it up, and this is the remnants – However this isn’t such a bad thing. The movie is cute, it holds its charm throughout the movie and the creepiness is cute – for a dysfunctional teen. Not necessarily a kids movie, so i wouldn’t recommend taking your younger brother or sister to see it.
Rating: 82.5/ 100