REVIEW: ‘ParaNorman’ reveals child hero
Who doesn’t love the horror genre? Vampires, ghosts and zombies rock. They simultaneously try to scare the willies out of us and take us on a roller-coaster ride of macabre thrills. Though the market is flooded with so-called “torture porn” flicks and slasher fests, hardly any of these horror efforts are aimed at younger audiences.
With some notable exceptions, creepy stop-motion animated romps are almost as rare as witch hangings, the dead returning to life and specters that inhabit our towns. “ParaNorman” wisely chooses to embrace all of these ideas and run with them. It is a film that is both extremely delightful and positively eerie, and adults will likely enjoy it as much, if not more than, children will.
The film begins with a particularly nice touch for exploitation and horror flick aficionados. A “Feature Presentation” banner complete with a hissing, low-grade soundtrack appears and leads up to a pillar-boxed show of a girl stepping on a quite-literally spongy, half-eaten brain while trying to evade a zombie break-in.
Armed with square teeth, an exposed skull and a devious smile, the zombie laboriously works its way over to the frantic woman as she literally screams for about eight seconds – just to catch her breath, look at the camera with a puzzled look, and start screeching again as the zombie is still inching toward her. She even pushes a microphone out of the way. It turns out Norman is just watching a horror movie.
Norman Babcock, voiced by Kodi Smit-McPhee, has the unusual gift of being able to see the dead and commune with them. He routinely speaks with his deceased grandmother and none of his family members or peers at school believe he can actually do what his reputation suggests. This makes for some rather entertaining dialogue.
Norman’s father Perry, voiced with perfect angst by Jeff Garlin, says in one part, “Son, your Grandma is in a better place,” to which Norman responds, “No she isn’t. She’s in the living room.”
The anniversary of a centuries-old curse is fast approaching and the enigmatic Mr. Prenderghast, voiced by John Goodman, has a job for Norman to accomplish. Because of Norman’s unique ability, he must read from a book at a witch’s grave to prevent her from re-awakening. The school bully Alvin, voiced by Christopher Mintz-Plasse, catches drift of this and interrupts the ritual, causing the horrendous spirit and a handful of puritan zombies to reawaken and terrorize the small Massachusetts town.
Now the motley crew of Norman, his cheerleader sister Courtney, Alvin, Neil and Mitch the jock must band together to stop the dead from destroying everything – if only they can just get along.
From start to finish, “ParaNorman” is completely self-aware of its cheesy horror roots. It embraces this aspect and pays loving homage to such genre classics as “Friday the 13th,” “Night of the Living Dead” and even episodes of “The Twilight Zone.” Norman has visions of the distant past and interacts with ghosts as if they are residents of the town. His ringtone even plays John Carpenter’s iconic musical score from “Halloween.” How cool is that?
Character interactions between the highly varied and cartoonish cast help make this film work as well as it does. Everyone is clearly having fun.
Neil, voiced by Tucker Albrizzi, relates to Norman while highlighting that he is actually a bit weirder. His older brother Mitch, voiced with a perfectly dopey demeanor by Casey Affleck, even manages to get some of the biggest laughs.
Mitch hits a zombie with his car in one scene and goes to check on the body and holds the head in his hands. Courtney, voiced by Anna Kendrick, asks if he is alright. The head then detaches from the body and Mitch still isn’t sure if the zombie is dead. This part hilariously represents some of the more outlandish conventions of horror movies where a character’s stupidity prevents them from seeing the bigger picture and acting accordingly. Mitch would have been zombie chow in any other horror flick.
The animation is exceptionally detailed and the distinct set and character models are plenty of fun to look at. From Prenderghast’s spiky beard to the severed limbs and locked jaws of the zombies, nary a boring visual element can be found anywhere. The CGI used to augment the witch’s ghastly green cloud and vortex almost looks true to real life.
Directors Chris Butler and Sam Fell have taken exceptional care to craft a riotous and entertaining homage to everything zombies and scares. “ParaNorman” lampoons the horror genre as much as it embraces and borrows from it to excellent effect. Only the most jaded and picky of moviegoers will strain to find something to dislike about this experience.
– Sam McConkie is a senior in the technical and professional writing program at USU. He is a keen writer and has been a dedicated gamer for years. Sam can be reached at sambonemcconkie@gmail.com