A spooky classic
Hey everyone! This week the movie I watched is actually quite close to home. From LAIKA Studios in Northern Oregon is the charmingly spooky 2012 film, ParaNorman (geez, I thought it was released in 2016, I sure feel old haha). ParaNorman is the tale of a young boy who has the gift to speak to the dead, and finding his place in a small town of non-believers. It is actually a very emotional story that had me tearing up slightly at certain points throughout the movie. Although, at it's core it is a great horror comedy that people of all ages can enjoy! Another thing about the movie that is so interesting, is that this was the first stop-motion animation film to use full-color 3d printing. Thanks to the now streamlined process, the title character alone has around 1.5 million facial expression combinations! Enough trivia though, let's get to the review.
The movie opens with a very 80/90s VHS aesthetic as we are shown a goofy fake zombie movie within our movie. Already within the first, few minutes of the film you'll be greeted to one of the many hilarious jokes. This one poking fun at how in horror the character could run away much rather then taking the time to scream, and the general campiness of movies from the era. When the zombie chomps on the lady in the movie, we cut to the reveal (as if it weren't already obvious) that it's simply a movie playing on a older tv, and in front of the tv is our protagonist Norman. Behind him on the couch is his grandmother knitting, playfully asking him "what's going on?", after explaining to her, she expresses why not just talk it out and get along (huh, just noticed that foreshadowing, nice). We then hear Norman's father calling out for him to take out the trash, as he leaves the room, his grandma asks him to tell his dad to turn up the heat as it's too cold. In this scene we are introduced to Norman's other family members, a disgruntled father trying to change out a light bulb, his mother cooking a meal, and his older teen sister who is seen talking on her phone with a friend of her's. After he takes out the trash, Norman seems nervous, but goes up to his father and tells him his grandma's request, it is then the household comes to an abrupt stop. It's revealed to the audience that grandma is dead and what Norman was talking to was her ghost, though no one believes Norman in that he can speak to the dead. This isn't even unusual as in the next scene we see Norman walking to school greeting and interacting with every ghost he comes across, even the ghost of a freshly ran over raccoon. When he arrives at school, we also see that he isn't just considered odd in his family, all the students actively avoid him, along with a bully who teases him. This was one of the parts that got to me emotionally, I may not be able to speak to the dead, but I can relate to how it feels to be isolated and purposefully left out just because of your differences, he also feels relatable to me because simply judging from his bedroom he's a real horror aficionado, and what's not to love about that!
After a quick bullying session from school bully, Alvin, we cut to Norman and the others from his class rehearsing for a play about the history of the town. The drama teacher takes it too seriously however, and when giving off an example of how she wants them to act this allows for the audience to learn about the myth surrounding the town. What we now know so far is that a witch, before being hung, cursed her seven accusers to eternal damnation, and that they will rise from their graves as the living dead. School is soon dismissed, and first we see Norman walking by himself only to be joined by Neil, a kid his age who despite not having the exact same problem as Norman is also bullied, and because of that they should become friends. Norman of course is hesitant at first, but decides to hang out with him for a bit after Neil helped scare off Norman's crazy uncle Mr. Prenderghast (From his mom's side of the family). Upon hearing that Norman can speak to the dead, Neil asks if he can perhaps speak to his dog, Bub, who unfortunately, and ironically was ran over by a animal recuse vehicle. The two boys soon quickly bond and become friends as they play with the ghost dog, Norman finally finding a friend. Though everything is not at peace, Mr. Prenderghast is acting frantic, he's nearing the end of his life and he needs to pass a certain book to Norman so he can stop the witch, though he dies before he can give it to him. Later that night is the annual play, it goes well until Norman is swept into a terrifying hallucination, in which a tree tells him that the dead are coming. Norman tries to tell everyone, only to be laughed at, and his father admitting that he wished Norman were born normal. Our hero is then grounded for something he can't even control, his mother tries to comfort him saying that when people are scared they sometimes do, and say things they shouldn't. Upon asking why his father is afraid of him, his mother corrects him saying that his father is scared for him (that still really doesn't excuse his attitude in my opinion).
The next day, Norman is treated as the laughingstock of the entire school. He retreats to a bathroom stall, so he can be alone. It's during this scene, he finds out his uncle had died as seen by the fact that his ghost approaches him, albeit with some bad timing, as in the stall next to Norman is Alvin. Prenderghast's ghost tells Norman that he must read from a book located with his body at his house, and he must do it before sundown that day, or else the witch, and the dead will awaken. After fulfilling his unfinished business, Prenderghast moves on to the afterlife. Alvin then chases Norman out of the school, and we skip to later on after school. Norman is sitting in his bedroom now realizing that all the zombie memorabilia might've been a bad idea. His grandmother then talks to him, saying that it's okay to be scared as long as it doesn't change who he is. It is during this scene we also get a nice little easter egg when Norman's phone rings, his ringtone is the theme to the 1978 classic Halloween. Now filled with courage, Norman sneaks out of the house, which is rather easy when his older sister is supposed to be watching him, but instead is on her phone talking to one of her friends. Norman zooms by Alvin on his bicycle, making the bully peeved, and start following him, as Norman interrupted his (terrible) break-dancing. The audience can see the sun now falling into the horizon. Norman hurries into his uncle's house and finds the body, and with it, the book tightly secure in his cold, dead hands. After successfully retrieving the book, he heads to the burial ground of the seven accusers thinking that is the place he needs to be. Norman quickly realizes however, that this is no spell book, or anything, much rather, it's the story of Sleeping Beauty. The boy is understandably very confused, but not knowing what to do, he tries to read it, only for Alvin to take the book from him. The sun now completely sets, and with it spooky things start happening. A large purple, and green cloud forms in the sky, resembling a witch's face. The ground beneath the boys cracks as the seven accusers now rise from the grave. They understandably run away from the zombies.
Courtney, Norman's older sister finally notices that her brother is missing and goes to search for him. She first heads to Neil's house knowing that the two are friends. What she didn't know was that, Neil's older brother is her crush, Mitch, who was introduced earlier in the film. The three head towards the graveyard, as Neil mentions that Norman said he had to go there. On their way they coincidentally come across Norman, and Alvin, as well as the zombies. There is a funny part here where Mitch drop kicks a zombie's head and only cares about how far he kicked it (As you can probably tell, he isn't very bright). The leader of the zombies, the judge, manages to cling onto the van as our main characters drive off. Seeing this, the other zombies follow the van into town where in a hilarious plot twist, the humans are a bigger danger to the zombies, then the zombies are to the humans. The group breaks into the town hall to access the archives in hope of finding out where the witch was buried, though they can't find the information they need. As the witch now looms over the town hall, Norman climbs to the top of the roof in a last-ditch effort to stop her. It doesn't work of course though, and instead the witch shoots our protagonist with a bolt of lightning, burning a hole into the book, and making Norman fall through the roof, back into the archives. While unconscious Norman has a dream that reveals something important, the witch was in fact a little girl, a girl who had the same powers as him, powers that were mistaken for witchcraft. We also find out that the witch's name is Agatha Prenderghast (Which makes Norman the descendant of a witch, nice). When he comes to, he sees the zombies are now surrounding him, though instead of running away this time he confronts them, asking why they killed her. The zombified judge then confesses that what they did was wrong, that they were just scared at the time, and thought that would be the best thing to do. Now with the truth revealed, Norman doesn't want to put Agatha back to sleep, instead he now sets out to help her spirit finally cross over, thus ending the curse. Upon leaving the town hall, Norman, and the zombies are cornered by a mob of hostile civilians, at first things are looking pretty bad for them, but the mob is stopped when Courtney, Neil, Mitch and even Alvin step in to defend him, and talk sense into the crowd. The mob calms down, though this angers Agatha causing her to stir up a ghostly hurricane, destroying everything in her way. Norman's parents now finally getting a better understanding of their son, drive him, the judge zombie, and Courtney over to where the Agatha was buried, under the tree she was hung from (I think? They never said which tree she was hung from, only that she was buried under that specific one). The trees in the forest come to life, separating our hero from his family, forcing him to have to go alone to confront Agatha.
Agatha is understandably angry at the world for what they did to her, but Norman attempts to talk sense into her saying that lashing out against the world makes her no better then the people who hung her. Her spirit gets increasingly more violent, and destructive as Norman tells her a new story, one that sounds very familiar to what she went through. He pleads to the ghost to remember who she was, an innocent child, as he seemingly falls to his doom, the area changes around him. The entire area including the old tree transform into what it looked like a few centuries ago. Agatha, now looking normal remembers that she was a little girl named "Aggie", and that her mother would sometimes take her to that tree and tell her stories underneath it. Aggie asks Norman if he ever wants to lash out against those that wronged him, he simply replies that even though it would be nice, it would do nothing, in fact it would make him no better then his bullies. He then proceeds to explain to her that he at first believed that there was no one in the world who understands him, but now knows that "There is always someone for everyone". The two befriend each other and sit underneath the tree, wanting to be with her mother once more, she leans over onto Norman and finally allows herself to pass on to the afterlife. Norman returns to his parents who praise him, and they return to town to find that the souls of the dead accusers had passed on as well, and everything is now fine and calm. We do get a funny moment at this point as well, Courtney asks Mitch out on a date to go see a movie, and Mitch responds positively saying, "You're gonna love my boyfriend. He's like a total chick-flick nut!". It was actually this moment that caused ParaNorman to become the first PG-rated movie to be nominated for a GLAAD (Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) Media Award, which at the time was rather groundbreaking. After this scene we finish off with a rather heartwarming moment in which Norman is watching a scary movie once more with his grandmother's ghost watching over him on the couch. His father then enters the room and sits on the couch next to the spirit, asking Norman if she's in the room. Upon nodding his head, he turns to where he thinks she's sitting and greets her, making his grandmother's spirit surprised, but very happy. The rest of the family then come into the room and sit down with Norman. His father and grandmother then ask in unison, "So, what's going on?", and the movie ends. It's a really sweet way of ending the movie, as we now see his family accepting him for who he is, and being a better family because of it.
Overall, ParaNorman is a very good movie that can watched anytime of the year. It shows kids that it's okay to be scared, and the right way to deal with bullying. The art is also very gorgeous, with everything being handmade. Personally you should do anything you can to support this animation studio, they make such amazing films that unfortunately don't make much at the box office. All in all, I highly recommend giving this movie a watch with 5 out of 5 paws up!
Courtney, Norman's older sister finally notices that her brother is missing and goes to search for him. She first heads to Neil's house knowing that the two are friends. What she didn't know was that, Neil's older brother is her crush, Mitch, who was introduced earlier in the film. The three head towards the graveyard, as Neil mentions that Norman said he had to go there. On their way they coincidentally come across Norman, and Alvin, as well as the zombies. There is a funny part here where Mitch drop kicks a zombie's head and only cares about how far he kicked it (As you can probably tell, he isn't very bright). The leader of the zombies, the judge, manages to cling onto the van as our main characters drive off. Seeing this, the other zombies follow the van into town where in a hilarious plot twist, the humans are a bigger danger to the zombies, then the zombies are to the humans. The group breaks into the town hall to access the archives in hope of finding out where the witch was buried, though they can't find the information they need. As the witch now looms over the town hall, Norman climbs to the top of the roof in a last-ditch effort to stop her. It doesn't work of course though, and instead the witch shoots our protagonist with a bolt of lightning, burning a hole into the book, and making Norman fall through the roof, back into the archives. While unconscious Norman has a dream that reveals something important, the witch was in fact a little girl, a girl who had the same powers as him, powers that were mistaken for witchcraft. We also find out that the witch's name is Agatha Prenderghast (Which makes Norman the descendant of a witch, nice). When he comes to, he sees the zombies are now surrounding him, though instead of running away this time he confronts them, asking why they killed her. The zombified judge then confesses that what they did was wrong, that they were just scared at the time, and thought that would be the best thing to do. Now with the truth revealed, Norman doesn't want to put Agatha back to sleep, instead he now sets out to help her spirit finally cross over, thus ending the curse. Upon leaving the town hall, Norman, and the zombies are cornered by a mob of hostile civilians, at first things are looking pretty bad for them, but the mob is stopped when Courtney, Neil, Mitch and even Alvin step in to defend him, and talk sense into the crowd. The mob calms down, though this angers Agatha causing her to stir up a ghostly hurricane, destroying everything in her way. Norman's parents now finally getting a better understanding of their son, drive him, the judge zombie, and Courtney over to where the Agatha was buried, under the tree she was hung from (I think? They never said which tree she was hung from, only that she was buried under that specific one). The trees in the forest come to life, separating our hero from his family, forcing him to have to go alone to confront Agatha.
Agatha is understandably angry at the world for what they did to her, but Norman attempts to talk sense into her saying that lashing out against the world makes her no better then the people who hung her. Her spirit gets increasingly more violent, and destructive as Norman tells her a new story, one that sounds very familiar to what she went through. He pleads to the ghost to remember who she was, an innocent child, as he seemingly falls to his doom, the area changes around him. The entire area including the old tree transform into what it looked like a few centuries ago. Agatha, now looking normal remembers that she was a little girl named "Aggie", and that her mother would sometimes take her to that tree and tell her stories underneath it. Aggie asks Norman if he ever wants to lash out against those that wronged him, he simply replies that even though it would be nice, it would do nothing, in fact it would make him no better then his bullies. He then proceeds to explain to her that he at first believed that there was no one in the world who understands him, but now knows that "There is always someone for everyone". The two befriend each other and sit underneath the tree, wanting to be with her mother once more, she leans over onto Norman and finally allows herself to pass on to the afterlife. Norman returns to his parents who praise him, and they return to town to find that the souls of the dead accusers had passed on as well, and everything is now fine and calm. We do get a funny moment at this point as well, Courtney asks Mitch out on a date to go see a movie, and Mitch responds positively saying, "You're gonna love my boyfriend. He's like a total chick-flick nut!". It was actually this moment that caused ParaNorman to become the first PG-rated movie to be nominated for a GLAAD (Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) Media Award, which at the time was rather groundbreaking. After this scene we finish off with a rather heartwarming moment in which Norman is watching a scary movie once more with his grandmother's ghost watching over him on the couch. His father then enters the room and sits on the couch next to the spirit, asking Norman if she's in the room. Upon nodding his head, he turns to where he thinks she's sitting and greets her, making his grandmother's spirit surprised, but very happy. The rest of the family then come into the room and sit down with Norman. His father and grandmother then ask in unison, "So, what's going on?", and the movie ends. It's a really sweet way of ending the movie, as we now see his family accepting him for who he is, and being a better family because of it.
Overall, ParaNorman is a very good movie that can watched anytime of the year. It shows kids that it's okay to be scared, and the right way to deal with bullying. The art is also very gorgeous, with everything being handmade. Personally you should do anything you can to support this animation studio, they make such amazing films that unfortunately don't make much at the box office. All in all, I highly recommend giving this movie a watch with 5 out of 5 paws up!
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