Review of ParaNorman (2012) by Kenneth L — 03 Mar 2013

This is a beautiful, funny, and surprisingly sophisticated animated movie. For some reason, stop-motion animation movies these days often seem to be just plain better than their CGI counterparts. This one, from the same studio (but not the same director or writer) as Coraline, similarly follows a kid dealing with scary supernatural beings. At first it seems like it will be goofier and more generally accessible than Coraline, and for a while it is, but in the last half-hour or so the movie reveals itself to be more thoughtful than it had seemed to be.

The premise plays at first like a kids' version of The Sixth Sense - Norman is a little kid who, it so happens, can see and speak to ghosts everywhere. For the most part, though, he gets along with the ghosts better than with the living people around him. But then a series of circumstances involving a witch's curse and zombies force Norman into an adventure to save his town.

The voice cast brings together a number of great character actors. Kodi Smit-McPhee, the kid from the movie version of The Road, does a fine job voicing Norman, a character who has to carefully think his way through the dangers that confront him. Christopher Mintz-Plasse (McLovin from Superbad) is amusing as the local bully. Jeff Garlin and Leslie Mann are pretty funny as Norman's parents, and Anna Kendrick's performance as Norman's shallow sister completely goes against her down-to-earth persona in live-action roles. Two smaller roles are played by two of the very best character actors in the business: Elaine Stritch is great as Norman's ghostly grandmother, and John Goodman gives a super-energetic performance as Norman's ostracized uncle.

The stop-motion animation is gorgeous, on a par with the work on Coraline. The special effects used to create the ghost puppets must have been quite difficult to deal with. The climactic sequence in particular is visually imaginative in a way that only animation can ever really be. The zombies, and especially the darker revelations towards the movie's end, make it too scary for kids under about ten years old, I would say. But for anyone over the age of ten, this movie would work terrifically. I really was surprised and impressed by how complex and thematically interesting the final scenes of the movie turned out to be. I look forward to this studio's next movie.