Coraline (2009) is a strangely wonderful animated creation. It's not your typical Disney or Pixar type of film (it's produced by Laika), but it effectively competes. No major spoilers will occur.
STORY: A young girl finds a curious door inside her new home that leads to a fantasy world that's a better version of her own. However, this world may not be what it seems.
Right away, you'll notice that this is a stop-motion film. Through a combination of miniature sets and animation transitions, compelling visuals are produced. A minute and a half of runtime took a week to produce totaling four years to make this movie. Animated films can already take twice as long, but stop-motion films require more patience. For comparison, Disney's Frozen took fourteen months on a very intense schedule, and Avengers: Endgame took just nine months to film. Cinema like Coraline needs to be a hit with so much invested, and I think this one was.
The protagonist and star, Coraline herself, is an adventurous girl. The initial setup is bromide with her parents worrying more about work than paying attention to work, but the plot and she quickly become unique and interesting. I believe the plotline she follows of how she'd react to various events in the story. Anytime that Coraline is in the real world, everything around her is grey and gloomy except for her. She wears a pop of color.
I keep coming back to the visuals because it's so exceptional including cinematography. Yes, animated films do have cinematography. Some pundits will say no. The top result when you ask on Google is from a random Reddit user, so that's hardly an authoritative source. Cinematography includes camera angles, color, lighting, placement suggestions of the characters and objects among other things. That makes animated features applicable, and Coraline has exceptional work. James Cameron's Avatar was nominated, and it's mostly CGI. I'd argue Coraline should have received a nomination.
Everything is different between Coraline's real world and the "other world". The colors go from forlorn to excited. The house goes from broken-down to vivid and neat. I don't want to say too much because it's worth watching yourself. Also, I really like the cat in the movie.
I may be chastised for this opinion. Pixar's Up won the major award shows for the best-animated film... but it shouldn't have. Coraline is better. I like the story, visuals, and even main characters more. It was recognized with nominations at least.
Coraline is an excellent picture that I was aware of but now am happy to have seen. Consider watching it today! My film rating is an A.
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