Coraline (animation): Difference between revisions

[[File:coraline-poster.jpg|frame]]

 

When she refuses, the film takes a dark turn as the Other Mother attempts to force Coraline to stay in her world, and Coraline must rely on her bravery and wits to get back home.

 

* [[3D Movie]]

* [[Abandoned Warehouse]]: Where the movie was made.

** Apparently Gaiman himself requested this trope. He saw that the original script was almost exactly like the book and told them to make some changes. After all, if someone wanted something ''exactly'' like the book, they had the book.

*** Also, since exposition doesn't work quite the same way in movies as in books, the addition of Wybie was sort of necessary, as Gaiman himself has said.

* [[Adorkable]]: Wybie.

* [[Adults Are Useless]]: Partly averted. Bobinsky, Spink and Forcible, and later, Coraline's mother, each give Coraline warnings against danger (it's only because she ignores them that the warnings amount to nothing), and {{spoiler|Spink and Forcible give Coraline an important piece of [[Applied Phlebotinum]] that turns out to be a useful tool in finding the ghost children's eyes.}}

** {{spoiler|Wybie's grandmother also suspects that the house had something to do with her vanished sister and thus tries to keep other children from staying there.}}

** {{spoiler|The Other Father also tries to fight The Other Mother's control because he doesn't want to hurt Coraline. Before he plummets to his death, he tosses her one of the souls she needs to escape.}}

* [[Amazing Technicolor Population]]: Mr. Bobinsky. It is implied via the medal he wears that his blue skin (and possibly eccentric disposition) is due to being one of the Liquidators who cleaned up Chernobyl.

* [[Ambiguously Brown]]: Wybie is a very pale African-American with brown curly hair. It's possible he's actually mixed-race; his grandmother is more obviously black.

** The opening sequence {{spoiler|with the [[Artifact of Doom|doll]] being remade?}}

** The green stone near the end.

** "Rat crap."

* [[Chekhov's Gunman]]: The cat.

* [[Chess with Death]]: {{spoiler|Coraline searching for ghost children's hidden eyes, and for her parents, in exchange for everyone being released, vs. her agreeing to stay with Other Mother if she fails.}}

* [[Cloudcuckoolander]]: Wybie and Bobinsky.

* [[Costume Porn]]: With miniatures, no less.

* {{spoiler|[[Crap Saccharine World]]}}: {{spoiler|The Other World.}}

* [[Creepy Child]]:

** {{spoiler|The Ghost Children. Especially the one with her mouth frozen open in an expression of perpetual horror. Although they're actually quite nice.}}

* [[Creepy Doll]]: creepy doll Creepy Doll <big>CREEPY DOLL!!</big>

* [[Cute Mute]]: The Other Wybie.

'''The cat:''' I just can.

'''Coraline:''' Cats don't talk at home.

* [[Design Student's Orgasm]]: Especially in the scenes where {{spoiler|the other world starts to disappear.}}

* [[Eyeless Face]]: {{spoiler|The Other Mother at the end.}}

* [[Eye Scream]]: "Black is traditional... But if you'd prefer pink... or vermilion... or chartreuse... Though you might make me jealous!" The fact that there's a ''needle'' next to the buttons makes it that much worse...

* [[Fan Disservice]]:

** The beginning half of the other Spink and Forcible's stage play... ugh. Both of the old women are practically naked, with only their nipples and crotch covered up. No amount of [[Brain Bleach]] will ever clear that out of your mind.

** The last part of their routine is pure [[Fan Service]] though.

** Also, when the {{spoiler|Other Mother transforms, her shirt becomes ''very'' low-cut, but since she's so hideous you don't even want to see it.}}

* [[Fire-Forged Friends]]: {{spoiler|Coraline and Wybie bond by fighting the Other Mother's evil hand of doom.}}

* [[Five-Bad Band]]:

** [[The Brute]] - The Other Bobinsky.

** [[The Dark Chick]] - The Other Ms. Spink and Ms. Forcible, and The Other Wybie.

* [[Food Porn]]: The dinner/breakfast/food scenes in the other world, despite the fact that the foods are fake.

* [[Foreshadowing]]:

** The words in the Other Father's song become much more sinister and foreboding once you find out {{spoiler|they want to put buttons in her eyes.}}

*** Following on that logic, the Other Wybie was {{spoiler|made of dirt. What comes off of the real Wybie's hand when he firsts meets Coraline?}}

** In the Other House, on the wall, there's three frames, each with the silhouette portrait of a child in them. Yeee...

** One of the Ghost Children says, as Coraline is collecting their eyes, "{{spoiler|Hurry girl, her web is unwinding!}}"

** And the most obvious one has to be {{spoiler|the hand}} in the tea leaves.

*** Even better, {{spoiler|Hamlet was ''mocking'' humans during that speech.}}

** A possible one, depending on how you take it, is the Other Mother telling Coraline {{spoiler|"It's all made up"}} on her first visit. Yeah, {{spoiler|the Other World certainly seems to be.}}

* [[Funny Foreigner]]: The rechristened-for-the-movie Mr. Bobinsky.

* [[Gag Boobs]]: Ms. Forcible. [[Fan Disservice|Emphasis on "gag"]].

* [[Giant Spider]]: {{spoiler|The Other Mother's "true" form ends up seeming to be this.}}

* [[Glamour Failure]]: The black button eyes, of course, but as Coraline continues to get to know the Other world the harder it is for the Other Mother to hide its true nature.

* [[Groin Attack]]: Narrowly averted when Mr. Bobinsky jumps off his deck and almost lands on Coraline, with his crotch coming within inches of the pair of garden trimmers she had in her hand.

* [[Harmful to Minors]]: Averted. Coraline laughs at naked women, though not as much as real-life children would.

** The Other Mother as well {{spoiler|at least until her transformation.}}

* [[Hypocritical Humour]]: "I'm way too old for dolls". Cue her playing with the doll and naming it "Little Me".

{{quote|''"Taaaaaake iiiiit..."''}}

* [[Impossible Hourglass Figure]]: The Other Spink and Forcible.

* [[Improvised Weapon]]: Our heroine {{spoiler|takes down the villain with a live cat}}. By ''throwing'' it as hard as she can. Yikes.

* [[Jump Scare]]: There are a few.

** Coraline suddenly gets grabbed by the Other Spink and Forcible monster.

* [[Know Your Vines]]: The title character brushes some leaves off a stick and uses it as a water rod. She meets Wybie, and has a fairly long conversation with him, and at the end he throws in that the stick she's holding is poison oak.

* [[Leitmotif]]:

** Arguably "Dreaming" for the Other world in general. The Other Mother even hums it.

** Wybie has two.

* [[Lighter and Softer]]: They actually toned down the creepiness from the book, believe it or not.

* [[Minion with an F In Evil]]: The Other Wybie and later on {{spoiler|the Other Father.}}

* [[Mood Whiplash]]: The film is famous for transitioning from fantasy to horror at the halfway point, when the true intentions of the Other Mother are revealed.

* [[Mysterious Animal Senses]]: The Cat was able to talk to Other Wybie, even though he couldn't speak. He even told Coraline that cats have far superior senses than humans, at which the [[Genre Savvy]] Coraline immediately rolled her eyes. There's also his ability to get between worlds on his own, which is pretty impressive.

* [[Mysterious Protector]]: The Cat followed and watched over Coraline for some time before making himself known to her.

* [[Never Trust a Trailer]]: Many people thought that the movie looked too "cutesy", judging by the trailer. Oh, how wrong they were...

* [[Nice Hat]]: Coraline's Japanese Academy Cap.

* [[Noodle Incident]]: Coraline's mother mentions a car accident that caused the family to move. She's also wearing a neck brace throughout the film.

* [[Noodle People]]:

** Mr. Bobinsky is a borderline example - he's round and rotund, but with spidery legs.

** The Other Mother starts out looking like Coraline's mother, along with her [[Hot Mom|legs]]. Gradually, she morphs and transforms throughout the story into a wizened, vaguely human creature with four spidery legs and arms made out of sewing needles.

* [[Notable Original Music]]

* [[Object Ceiling Cling]]: The candy bowl at Ms. Spink and Ms. Forcible's apartment.

* [[One-Winged Angel]]: {{spoiler|Over the course of the movie the Other Mother progressively gets more monstrous. She starts as a copy of Coraline's real mother, then gets [[Lean and Mean|thinner, spindlier and overall wicked-looking]]. By the end of the movie she reveals her true form - a spindly spider-human hybrid with [[Creepy Doll|cracked porcelain skin]], metal legs and hands with claws made of sewing needles.}}

* [[Parallel Porn Titles]]: The posters for the burlesque versions of [[Shakespeare]] plays in the actresses' apartment: ''Julius '''Sees-Her''' '', ''King '''LEER''''', etc.

* [[Perverse Puppet]]

* [[Powered by a Forsaken Child]]: To sustain her life, the Beldam must {{spoiler|consume all the love out of a child's soul after [[Eye Scream|sewing buttons over their eyes]].}}

* [[Power Trio]]: Coraline, Wybie and the Cat form one.

* [[Scenery Porn]]: Like you wouldn't believe. The garden, the mouse circus, and the theater in the other world are breathtaking.

* [[Seashell Bra]]: The Other Forcible wears one dressed as Venus.

* [[Shout-Out]]:

** To ''[[The Nightmare Before Christmas]]'': The pumpkins in the other mother's garden look like the Mayor of Halloweentown, and the tallest of the three Ghost Children resembles Shock. Similarly, when Wybie has his facemask/helmet on, he bears a strong resemblance to Barrel. There also might be one to [[Pixar]], as one of the Shakespeare players has a baby in a backpack that looks a lot like [[The Incredibles|Jack-Jack]].

** The ball that the rats were playing with was the one from [[Pixar Shorts|Luxo Jr.]]

** Also, at one point the other mother cracks an egg yolk into a bowl that yields ''[[The Nightmare Before Christmas]]'' lead character Jack Skellington's image.

*** Not surprising. He has his own line of slippers as part of his cartoon show's marketing gimmick.

** The piano in the other study has the gold word "Tadahiro" on it. Tadahiro Uesugi was a concept artist whom Henry Selick adored.

* [[Shy Blue-Haired Girl]]: Averted. Coraline is [[Little Miss Snarker|not shy]].

* [[Sirens Are Mermaids]]: During The Other Spink and Forcible's song, The Other Spink describes herself as "The siren of all seven seas" while dressed as a [[Our Mermaids Are Different|mermaid]].

* [[Spiritual Successor]]: To ''[[The Nightmare Before Christmas]]''. As well as Henry Selick's previous ''[[James and the Giant Peach]]'' adaptation. And ''[[Mirror Mask]]''.

* [[Stepford Smiler]]: The Other Mother, and most of the denizens in her realm.

* [[Stop Motion]]

* [[Swallow the Key]]: Done by the Other Mother.

* [[Tall, Dark and Snarky|Small, Dark, and Snarky]]: The cat.

* [[Totally Radical]]: Select pieces of Coraline's dialogue. It might come off as [[Narm]] to older viewers, since hardly any kid talks that way. The most [[Egregious]] examples:

{{quote|"Cripes almighty! How are my best trolls?!" (Upon seeing a moving picture of her friends)

* [[Trailers Always Spoil]]:

** The other mother's second form is on the back of the DVD box. The spoiler status of this could be argued though, as that's how she's described in the book from the beginning, as opposed to starting out as identical to Coraline's real mother.

* [[Unfortunate Names]]: Wybie is short for Wyborne. Ouch.

* [[Viewers Are Geniuses]]: It's highly doubtful many of the viewers knew {{spoiler|why the Ghost Children called the other mother "the beldam", and probably figured it was the name for whatever monster she was}}. Thank god for [[John Keats]] and [[The Other Wiki]]... (which would make [[A Good Name for a Rock Band|a really good band name]]...)

** The Fairy Ring of mushrooms around the abandoned well is a huge [[Chekhov's Gun]] to anyone who knows the appropriate folklore; to everyone else its just added scenery.

** The stone that Spink and Forcible give Coraline? It's an [[wikipedia:Adder stone|adder stone]].

*** It's just a passing gag, but how many people are going to get "[[Richard III|My kingdom for a horse!]]"

*** A phrase which can be interpreted as, "Everything I have for the one thing I don't"... [[Foreshadowing|just a]] [[Fridge Brilliance|passing gag]], eh?

* [[The Watson]]: The movie-original character Wybourne "Wybie" Lovat, who gives a reason for Coraline to give the exposition told in the book through narration.

* [[Weird Moon]]: As time wears on through Coraline's hunting game against the Other Mother, the moon is steadily eclipsed, and the shadow has an inner circumferential line and four holes (i.e., the shadow of a button). Coraline seems to take it as a time limit; at one moment the shadow notably (and ''audibly'' at that) grinds to a halt when {{spoiler|the final Ghost-Child's eye/soul is won.}}

* [[Where the Hell Is Springfield?]]: Some people recognized the town that Coraline's family moved to as Ashland, Oregon. The banners for the Shakespeare festival can be seen in several scenes. The studio is based in Portland.

* [[The Worm That Walks]]: The other Bobinsky near the end of the movie.

* [[X Meets Y]]: The movie is like ''[[Beetlejuice]]'' meets ''[[Alice in Wonderland]]''.

* [[You Gotta Have Blue Hair]]: Coraline. An 11-year old brunette dyeing her hair blue.

[[Category:The Millennium Age of Animation]]

[[Category:Films of the 2000s]]

[[Category:Western Animation]]