The presence of Tim Burton and Henry Selick loom large over
this film. While not in an official capacity, the world of horror inflected
stop motion animation is their hallowed turf. Anyone seen to be breaching this
ground is bound to be labelled a sub-par intruder but the makers of ParaNorman
have equalled, if not bettered, those by the sub-genre superstars.
Taking its cues from The Sixth Sense, ParaNorman concerns
eleven-year-old shock haired Norman, who can converse with dead people.
Cleverly that isn’t seen as a problem though – at least not for him. The
problem lies in the eyes of others; from his concerned mother and appalled
father to bullying contemporaries at school.
For a film that starts out with a flickery grindhouse homage
and the image on a trodden-on brain, it’s no surprise that the film is uncompromising
in its content for a film with this demographic, and rightly so (sample joke topics:
homosexuality, goosing, tits and ass). It would be untenable and pointless to
construct a film – animated or not – around the subject of the risen dead and
not pay homage to genre hallmarks.
That’s not to say there isn't a moral backbone to this illicit
children’s film. It is warmly nostalgic in its vision of warped Americana and
the central tenet of accepting difference in others runs through it like fresh
brains through a putrefying intestinal tract. There’s an infectious glee in the
way it doesn’t hold back on showing gruesome sights, such as a corpse’s lolling
tongue flapping onto our hero’s face.
The character design is positively grotesque – and that’s
just in the living. Blotchy skin, puffy eyes, asymmetrical faces, wobbling
bingo wings and monstrously protruding guts all feature heavily. The voice cast
seem to completely inhabit their parts. Softly spoken Kodi Smit-McPhee is a
beguiling lead as Norman, in stark contrast to his flustered parents voiced by
Leslie Mann and an exasperated Jeff Garlin. Playing against type, Casey Affleck
is completely unrecognisable as a lunk-headed Jock while Anna Kendrick flies in
the face of her usually prissy screen persona as Norman’s callow, vapid sister.
If anything, the characters are too stock but even that’s in keeping with much
of the genre it riffs on.
While obviously dancing in the general area of parody, the
film doesn’t stuff itself with references to other films. This is its own
thing. It takes time to establish its own world, drawing from sources as varied
as gory b-movies and its New England setting's history of puritanical witch
trials. The influence of John Carpenter does make itself apparent in the score
and a couple of sly nods to Halloween but never to the extent that it seems
homage is more important than plot.
What will leave the most lasting impression are the stunning
visuals. The model work and stop motion have a tactile charm but in coupling
those with fantastically audacious camerawork and liberal application of CGI,
it reaches new heights. The autumnal hues and ragged aesthetic give it a lived
in feel that completely fits the plot and the characters that inhabit it. A
scene of atmospheric turbulence in the skies above the town of Blithe Hollow is mind blowing in
how well realised it is.
Of course it’s relatively bloodless and the undead of the
film are rarely concerned with anything worse happening to them than losing a
dangling limb. Of course when that limb is 300 years old and decaying, it’s all
played for comic effect. There’s nothing too troubling – at least no more so
than munching on a jelly brain sweet.
Pleasingly plot driven and without the unnecessary baggage
that usually accompanies message focused animated films, it’s a flesh creeping
delight. It might not have the innocent charm to guarantee its longevity but
it’s a delightful, if slight, romp that doesn’t scale back on the visceral
pleasure of watching a horror film.
★★★★★
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