The Wonderfully Creepy Coraline

Unlike so many recent children’s animated films, there is nothing saccharine or sarcastic about the characters, dialogue, and emotions in Coraline, just released on DVD. This independent, willful female protagonist is a lonely kid who wants her work-obsessed parents to pay her a little attention. After her family moves to a dreary new home in a rainy, gray neighborhood, the adventurous Coraline explores her surroundings and uncovers a small door that at night opens a passageway to a new, better world. It looks a bit like her own but comes with an “other mother” who cooks and cares, an “other father” who builds a garden in Coraline’s image, and friends and neighbors who delight and entertain her. This Stepford world is scary, though: People have buttons for eyes, and that’s just the beginning of the soon-to-be-revealed creepiness underneath. Coraline presents opportunities to discuss whether you can trust what you see when things seem too good to be true—and what children can/should expect of their parents. It could also be fun to discuss whether this scary episode was all a dream—as the story sometimes suggests—or if it really did happen to Coraline. Coraline is a compelling, suspenseful story that will keep kids and parents wondering what’s going to happen next. You can watch Coraline in 2-D or 3-D, which is very cool—comes with your very own 3-D glasses!—but you have to wait until it is very dark out.