Latest / Houselights: A Film Director Podcast / Coraline (2009) - Henry Selick | Houselights #156

Transcript

Coraline (2009) - Henry Selick | Houselights #156 · Houselights: A Film Director Podcast

0:03
Welcome to the ned Palty. Welcome back to House Lights, our director discussion
0:23
show here on the Nerd Party Network. Today, we're continuing in the wing
0:27
of Selec with the stop motion work of director Henry Selik with his two thousand
0:32
and nine film Coraline. Will the immense symbolism be lost on us? Or
0:37
will we successfully return to Oregon. I'm Darren Mouse, Tamer Moser, and
0:42
I'm joining again by my friend, the other podcaster, John Mills. Our
0:47
friend Tristan has unfortunately disappeared this week inside a button shaped door in his basement.
0:53
But let's celebrate this thirteen year animation jump with Henry Selick's Coraline. Yes,
1:00
yes, yes, yes, that that is quite a jump in the
1:04
filmography here. I'm pretty convinced there's one that we've chosen not to look at
1:11
somewhere along the way. I think it was Mikey Bone that he also directed,
1:15
but we're not counting that as animated because it's mostly live action and we
1:19
just don't want to watch it. So that is that, that is all
1:23
extremely true, extremely true. So he he comes back in and this is
1:26
my first time encountering it, and I mean it's it's it's really interesting because
1:34
obviously he comes back in and now we're in the CG era right in the
1:41
two and nine. You're very different than ninety six. And it's really fascinating
1:48
because I actually did a small amount of reading also about the the adaptation of
1:53
it. So I know you've seen this before. Were you familiar with Neil
1:59
Gaiman's work, you know, core Line before you saw the movie. No,
2:02
I think it was just like the animated movie of the year, and
2:07
you're like, oh, look that looks interesting, and oh the guy who
2:09
did Nightmare, Oh okay, you know, so that's what drew me to
2:13
see it in theaters, you know. Nine. It's not like I had
2:15
kids yet at that point, but it looked interesting. It looked you know,
2:21
you can definitely tell even in the trailer that stop motion technology had advanced,
2:27
like you're starting to get three D printing, and I think they started
2:30
doing the kind of split face design where they have slight cuts at the line
2:37
of the eyes and so their eyebrows are one piece and their mouths are another
2:43
piece, and it just gives easier combinations of expression, I guess to animate.
2:49
But yeah, so when I first first saw it, it was just,
2:53
you know, a pretty looking film, and you know, I definitely
2:58
was gonna give it a fair shape. But and I just wanted to say
3:01
upfront that Tristan is still in the podcast. He has not retired or anything,
3:08
even though joking he's gone through a button shaped door. He just was
3:13
unable with scheduling issues to join us. Oh, he's still caught up in
3:16
the web. He's trying to, you know, work his way back.
3:19
And I thought I heard the skittering of a metal hand in some sort of
3:23
body heart made of metal after Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. So I
3:29
mean, I mean, I feel a little bit at a disadvantage knowing that
3:31
this is an adaptation but not being familiar with the original work, because I
3:36
know that I think Selik estimated it would be like a fifty minute movie if
3:40
he did just a straight adaptation. Yeah, he had to pad it out
3:44
a little bit. It's one hundred minutes, so that's kind of double that
3:47
estimation. I know. I've done a little bit of research as well.
3:52
It looks like ybe Wyborne was added in this adaptation. He's not exists in
3:58
the book, but he was also kind of a vessel to let Coraline talk
4:02
to somebody as opposed to just narrating inside her head like in the book,
4:08
which makes sense. I mean that is definitely a translation from book medium to
4:14
film medium. You you know nobody, I mean, and narration inside your
4:19
head can be done well, but it is not the preferred choice of communicating
4:24
information well. I mean, it can get it can get onerous. It's
4:29
a very difficult line. Like you look at the reaction to Narration and Apocalypse
4:32
Now versus the reaction and Narration and Blade Runner, and you have you have
4:39
essentially the same tool being used, but the reaction to it varies so greatly
4:44
that, Yeah, I think with something like this, I can't imagine that
4:47
Gayman's original work is too well known outside of certain circles. That's I didn't
4:55
know it's an adaptation. I just knew it was an animated movie when I
4:58
first saw it. So yeah, And I'm not saying it as a dig
5:00
I'm just saying, like, I know, Neil Gaman is known for stuff
5:03
like Sandman. But even if I went over to my wife and I was
5:05
like, hey, Neil Game and Sandman, she'd be like, what the
5:08
hell are you talking about? I'm like ah, okay, it's not a
5:13
broad as broad an appeal as say like a Star Wars or a Harry Potter
5:16
or something like that. I mean, I did try to play laser tag
5:19
to deal game in Sandman. It was really difficult with one eye on the
5:23
book while I was playing, Well, there you go, there you go.
5:27
That's that's very tough. But that's as a bit of a deep dive.
5:31
But yeah, with this one, I was really interested in rewatching it
5:35
because since first enjoying it, I came across someone and I wish I had
5:44
the name in front of me. Came across someone on TikTok who was deep
5:47
diving, and they were made a great series of little videos that showed like,
5:54
oh, this is what this means. And there's there's so much symbolism
5:58
jammed into this movie that I did not pick up on. Like obviously the
6:03
broad themes and the family dynamics, that's obvious, but little things like when
6:10
you when you realize that everything like obviously it's a stop motion movie, so
6:14
everything is made to be put in, but every but there's nothing that is
6:18
by chance, there is nothing that is Oh yeah, whatever color that is,
6:21
that doesn't matter. Nothing didn't matter in Henry Selick's creation of this,
6:28
So I was interested in reabsorbing and seeing if I could pick up those little
6:32
things. But it still kind of went over my head in a lot of
6:38
ways. Well, I mean, one of the things that I think I
6:41
would love to know if it's in there or described as such in the original
6:46
work is the door that she crawls through very obviously it looks like a birth
6:51
canal that she's like, there's a very burst now esque Strier hose, you
6:56
know, vibe. But yeah, that's a good point. But I mean,
7:00
you know, and so there's this idea of like being born into a
7:01
new world and then you know, but again, it's one of those things
7:05
where I'm not sure if I'm looking too deeply into it. But at the
7:09
same time, like you said, Selik obviously designed everything with specific intent sort
7:14
of stuff, and it's yeah, well, okay, So I'll give one
7:18
example, because the one I remember the most in the opening musical number,
7:24
where the other mother is making the doll. The wallpaper in that room is
7:30
this kind of speckle breasted bird that is a type of bird that lays that
7:39
that is able to change the color of its eggs, so when it lays
7:43
them in other birds nests, they they will raise that bird as their own.
7:50
And that is that is like the level of symbolism I'm talking about,
7:55
Like that is equating to what the other mother does, where they are kind
7:59
of like taking from our world and imitating. So again, I mean,
8:05
I did not pick up on that in the original view. I don't think
8:09
I'm meant to in totally ard, but see that totally blows my mind because
8:16
I'm like, I didn't notice that at all. I don't know what you
8:18
know, Okay, sure, but that is one of the tenth level intellect
8:24
stuff that I'm just like, I would not have guessed. Well. There's
8:28
additionally, though, I think, and this is sort of the age old
8:33
you know discussion, I would say, is what is the obligation of a
8:37
filmmaker to make it adequately accessible, right, because that's not accessible to me.
8:45
I have to have a knowledge of birds, I have to have knowledge
8:48
of a specific type of bird. And yes, that's a deep dive,
8:52
but I would say that maybe some of the storytelling shortcomings in the film stem
9:00
from the fact that a little bit too much obsession is put on that sort
9:03
of thing. As opposed to telling the story in a more in giving me
9:11
something more to hold on to, because I struggled in the first I don't
9:15
know how long watching this movie where I'm like, I'm not sure why I
9:20
care. Right now, I feel like I should. I think I get
9:24
the shape of why I should care, But at the same time I couldn't
9:28
help at the beginning feeling like there was an echo, I mean, not
9:33
an echo, but that Pixar had watched this movie before they made an inside
9:39
in it, before they had made Inside Out. Right, because the girl
9:43
moves, she feels disconnected from her parents. There's a lot going on inside
9:46
of her head. There's all of this stuff. She's very moody. It's
9:50
about growing up. It's about finding out how to reconnect and recommunicate with your
9:54
parents. You're not happy about where you moved. There were a lot of
9:58
things where I I really feel like the people who made Inside Out really like
10:03
Coraline a whole lot. Oh yeah, I definitely see that, and the
10:07
I mean the bird analogy. The nice thing is it's not like if you
10:11
missed that, you lost the thread of the story. It was definitely a
10:16
you know, almost a what's the word almost an easter egg, like you
10:22
don't need to know it, but it's there, and it's cool that it's
10:24
there. It's cool that that tenth degree you know level story is in there.
10:31
But yeah, I see what you're saying though, where there's a lot
10:35
of Wizard of Oz vibes where you have the same characters in both the other
10:41
world and in our world and the acting kind of you know different, and
10:48
and it's yeah it I'm also there was a moment yeah, because it did.
10:54
Also for me, it took a while, maybe at least halfway through,
10:56
where it kind of started to click, because there's a lot of fantasy
11:03
in this. Like I'm trying to tell myself, what is this a bedtime
11:09
story? Is this a grim's fairy tale? Like a cautionary tale? Like
11:15
what you know? It almost needed a narrator at the beginning, being like
11:18
this is the story of Coraline, a little girl who went through a button
11:24
door, you know what I mean? Like I get what you're saying,
11:28
where it's like, what am I supposed to take away from this? As
11:31
you're not that you can't just enjoy the story, I would I would offer
11:37
that with what you're saying if you're going to flesh out an adaptation so that
11:43
you're creating characters for the sake of explanation expository stuff, you could easily have
11:50
intro doced a character earlier in the thing. Who knew exactly how the like
11:56
the the ominous nature of the doorway, like that that the before, or
12:01
they knew, or there's a story about it. There's a story about kids
12:05
who went missing, and this person relays the story of, oh, kids
12:11
who stayed in that house. There are several kids who went missing, So
12:15
don't go exploring, stay close to your parents. There's nothing concrete given.
12:20
But when she then discovers the door, it's not just this magical thing of
12:24
oh look, it goes to fairytale land. It's oh, wait a minute,
12:28
I remember somebody talked about all of these missing kids. Oh, maybe
12:33
that has to do with this. It's sort of like in The Lost Boys,
12:37
seeing Lonnie's face on the milk carton and then meeting him later. You
12:43
know you have established early on, even if you never met Lonnie, that
12:46
people go missing, and there's this stuff about murder capital of the World.
12:50
And then Michael meets these strange people and Lonnie's among them and it's like,
12:54
oh, I get what's happening right now? These things are connected to each
12:58
other. Yeah, and they kind of have that with Whyborn, but he
13:03
it's interesting like like most mysteries because it's a mystery story really like we're being
13:07
unveiled with what is happening. You know, we don't know any more than
13:13
Coraline does at any given moment. There were not really privy to any insider
13:18
information. So as Whyborn is kind of, like you said, in that
13:24
role of caution cautionary, but he doesn't really give a lot like he and
13:30
I think, just like they were saying, that character being written just so
13:35
she's not talking to herself all the time, like a lot of the things
13:37
she says to him is processing and not and she would be saying it either
13:43
way. But if he's not there, she's talking to the cat or talking
13:48
to the you know, the cat was more explained, had more concrete explanation
13:52
than anybody. But that I think you put your finger on it right there.
13:56
You you lean up the story and you have something that is actually fairly
14:03
relatable to somebody who might not have friends in their life talking to a pet
14:09
or an animal that's in their life sort of thing. There's a very Disney
14:11
esque aspect to it. There's a very animated aspect to it. And then
14:16
later when the cat starts talking, you can have her say I've been talking
14:20
to you this whole time, and you understood me. Why didn't I hear
14:24
you talk? And the cat can say, well, maybe you just weren't
14:28
listening well enough. Well that's what the cat that's saying. He says words
14:31
along those lines. Yeah, Well he's like, I didn't choose to or
14:35
or you know, no, it was something even a little I forget the
14:41
exact wording, but he acknowledges that he was communicating at least, and maybe
14:46
she didn't have the ears to hear it sort of thing. I mean,
14:50
what's Keith David, So I'm going to listen to anything he says, like
14:52
with that amazing grace, great voice casting. But you know they play the
15:00
way they play the cat just to wrap the cat up is there's just enough
15:07
curiosity where you're kind of like, could the cat talk in our world and
15:13
just chose not to? Like the fact that we never see him talk in
15:16
the real world, I understand, but I almost feel like he could like
15:20
the way he nods and responds to her. It's it's a very nice blurred
15:26
line between the worlds, and he is the creature that can go between the
15:30
worlds, you know, besides besides Coraline. Yeah, it's It's just it's
15:37
tough because I don't know if I'm unique in the trouble I've had connecting with
15:43
it as a work. Because when my daughter, my oldest daughter, saw
15:48
me watching it, she said, oh, you've never seen Coraline before,
15:52
and I said, no, I haven't, okay, and she was familiar
15:54
and she said, oh, I really like this, And I said,
15:56
why do you like this? And you know, she's an old kids,
16:00
so she's not going to sit down and start watching it with me, and
16:02
she goes, well, I feel like i'd spoil it, So okay.
16:06
I have to go back and say, okay, so what was it that
16:08
you liked so much about this? But usually if one of my kids does
16:14
connect with something, as she obviously did with this, I can sort of
16:17
figure it out. But I got to ask you, I mean, like,
16:19
did you connect more easily with it this time? Did you have any
16:22
trouble connecting with it previously? It was about the same both times. Honestly,
16:29
it was a beautifully animated world, Like I think it looks amazing,
16:36
the story is creative. The other mother is like terrifying, especially when she
16:42
kind of elongates and spiderfies. But it was interesting. Maybe it comes down
16:48
to coreline herself, like understanding what what is this kid wanting? And I
16:55
didn't have the experience growing up of like two working parents that didn't have time
17:00
for me. That wasn't my life, so I didn't I couldn't relate in
17:03
that direct way. I could understand and sympathize with her. You know.
17:07
I again, I enjoyed it, but I don't feel like I'm going to
17:08
pull this off the shelf for another decade, Like I don't feel the need
17:12
to revisit it over and over. It didn't. It didn't catch me in
17:17
that way, Whereas I've watched Nightmare Before Christmas dozens of times, and I
17:22
don't know. That's a hard thing to say, why one versus the other?
17:27
Really, And and let's be completely honest because people will point to this
17:32
and say, oh, it's an adaptation, so is the Nightmare Before Christmas.
17:37
It's an adaptation of a poem that Tim Burton wrote when he was an
17:41
animator. Right, so you talk about stretching something out that a little bit
17:47
more, and I would I what I find well James and the Giant Peach.
17:52
Yeahs right, James and the Giant Peach as well. But what I
17:55
find interesting is these are three adaptations essentially that we've watched in a row.
18:00
What is it that I mean, we talked about James and the Giant Peach
18:03
last week and we kind of know what didn't work with that. But my
18:08
question is, why did Nightmare before Christmas work so darn well? When Selk
18:17
seems to have trouble adapting these other works? What is it that he is
18:22
having trouble latching onto and conveying? And if I'm having trouble, he's got
18:26
to be having trouble in some sense in telling the story. Although it's interesting
18:32
because I don't feel that the issues of Coraline are the same issues as James
18:36
and the Giant Peach. I feel like this one is fully animated. It's
18:40
gorgeous. It really I don't want to watch this in a live action.
18:48
I don't want to hear this story. I want to see it either computer
18:52
animated or stop motion animated. I think it needs to be that kind of
18:56
medium to tell this particular tale, so I think it's got that going for
19:00
it. But yeah, it's I don't know. I don't know what it
19:06
is that makes it hard to relate to. And maybe it's an age thing.
19:12
Maybe it's younger kids who are in that similar finding themselves, maybe having
19:19
a spat with their parent moment of their lives. They're connecting in way more
19:25
ways than we are. I'm not sure we haven't shown it to our kids
19:30
yet, mainly just because it gets a little intense with the visuals. Not
19:37
that I don't think they could handle that, but there's many other things on
19:40
our lists at this point. Yeah, I don't know that I necessarily agree
19:47
that because it's geared toward a younger audience that I shouldn't also latch onto it,
19:53
at least approaching equally as well, because again, Nightmare before Christmas appeals.
20:00
It's that whole thing that it appeals to the child inside. And I
20:06
don't fault Goreline if there's something that enables younger audiences to connect to it better
20:12
than I can, but I should not be struggling as I am to give
20:18
it purchase, at least intellectually, and there's a very significant part of this.
20:25
I think where what goes slightly awry with the adaptation is I think that
20:32
the number of trips she takes to that other world, there's sort of an
20:37
imbalance with the amount of time she spends in locations, okay, And I
20:42
think that probably is something that the movie just has trouble overcoming. I think
20:51
that looking at the larger story of it, Obviously Tim Burton was pretty involved
20:59
as we understand it from the Nightmare before Christmas where he he was there.
21:03
He was a producer, he was involved with things. James and the Giant
21:10
Peach and Coraline are Seleek on his own power, and I think that it
21:17
might be that Selek's real strengths to your point, what you're talking about and
21:22
what I gleefully acknowledge that Selek has an incredible technical craft, skill and eye.
21:30
He's incredible stuff to do this stuff, but he needs somebody else there
21:36
with him who is a Tim Burton to guide him along, to push it
21:41
to that one hundred percent that's gonna boom, or or even a better version
21:45
of the script, a more cohesive version of the script. And you know
21:48
who I'm going to throw under the bus right now is JJ Abramsky, because
21:52
when abrams is not involved in screenwriting, I love his work Star Trek Go
21:59
nine, Mission Impossible three, the first two thirds of Star Trek Into Darkness,
22:03
But once abram starts fiddling with the script, it's like, hey,
22:07
hey, no, stay on your lane. Let let the other people worry
22:11
about that part of it. And so I wonder if it's just that Selik
22:17
is so comfortable in one area he's never quite figured out how to be in
22:22
both. And that's not a knock on an artist. That is just people
22:26
have strengths, and maybe it's just that it's not his strength to be,
22:33
you know, the the overall person driving the thing, but the person executed,
22:37
refining, refining, collaborating, taking it to that next level. It's
22:42
sort of like what they said about Conan O'Brien with The Simpsons, that when
22:47
he was a writer on the Simpsons, he didn't really come up with all
22:51
of this original material, but every time somebody threw it on the table,
22:53
he found a little way to twist the punchline to make it better. And
22:57
that's not a knock either, because you can grow into that person who's who's
23:02
steering everything. I just feel like watching these movies. Maybe it's just it's
23:07
just that stop motion animation is so labor intensive. You can't step away from
23:12
the canvas enough, and you need somebody who can step away from the canvas.
23:17
And we talked about this a little bit last week. With stop motion
23:19
animation, it's it's a bear like because you and again I haven't made any
23:26
future length stop most animations myself, so I'm kind of speculating a little bit,
23:30
but I get the feeling that it's much much harder, if not impossible,
23:36
to find the story or find what's supposed to happen. You have to
23:42
already have it down pat before you start, because other or you can,
23:49
but your budget is now double because you had to scrap what you had already
23:55
started and pivot. So yeah, with with Coraline, you know this,
24:00
obviously, you have the duality of the other world and our world. You
24:04
have the characters, you have the again kind of a grim fairy tale.
24:11
The other mother is this kind of creature that is not her true form,
24:15
that is feeding on the love or connection to a child. Like that's a
24:21
really interesting aspect of it, and you know, viewing through the button,
24:26
eye dolls and all those spooky things. But yeah, there's that. I
24:33
almost feel like it's a catch twenty two because you need so much time in
24:37
the beginning to learn about Coraline, to learn about her actual parents and her
24:42
friends and her situation before you even go into the other world. Otherwise there's
24:48
no comparison, there's no contrast. But like you said, because of that,
24:53
you spend a long time before you actually get to the inciting incident.
25:00
The anxiety incident is way deep in this story, like it takes a while
25:03
to get there. And but I don't know the solution. I don't have
25:08
a magical formula of like what percentage you should have of which, But once
25:14
you actually get into the other world, and yeah, like you said,
25:18
maybe it's are you saying it's too many times that she's visiting the other world
25:22
or not enough? I don't know. I mean it's or there should be
25:26
fewer, but they're longer because she visits what like three times. I think
25:30
it, I think it. I think that's it. I think it needs
25:33
more time to breathe. Like I, it's difficult to put your finger on
25:37
it because I think to your point, if you're editing live film, you
25:41
can sit there and you can say, okay, I can let's go back
25:45
for a quick reshoot, or let's let's go back to the original, like
25:48
let's re edit and let's go around and let's let's play with it. Whereas
25:52
with this, it's so it's even arguably I would say that stop motion winds
25:56
up being the it's like the fax machine of animation. Animation graduated to CG
26:04
and they had more freedom, and now they've got the point where they you
26:08
know, they have almost live film freedom with it. You know, we
26:12
Tristan talked about Frozen two, right, we all talked about it last time,
26:17
where it's like they could just they didn't even know how the story was
26:19
going to end when they started. You can't imagine that, Yeah, you
26:22
wouldn't animation that it wouldn't and so and so, in a sense, stop
26:27
motion is that artifact that you know, it's it's the fax machine. It
26:30
hasn't but like it's never going to be anything but what it is sort of
26:34
thing again, not not dismissing it, not saying that's that it's a bad
26:40
art form. It's a tremendous art form, but it's not flexible the way
26:45
that movies want to be now, and I think that expanding the script out,
26:52
I don't know if there was a step, considering that the budget was
26:56
sixty million dollars, I don't know if there was an animax step, because
27:02
is that the solution is to go, Okay, you know what, We're
27:04
going to make a very rudimentary animation. We're going to watch it play,
27:07
and then we're going to say does this work? Well, there's also and
27:12
then do the stop motion animation. I keep thinking of what you said about
27:18
Nightmare, and you know it just that came from Tim Burton's soul, like
27:22
he wanted you to feel a particular way about that, about the holiday,
27:27
about Christmas and all of that. I don't know what I'm supposed to feel
27:34
in Coraline. Am I supposed to feel trepidation that Coraline might like? Or
27:41
is the longing of the accepting family that Coraline's going after? I don't know.
27:48
The steaks, Okay, the steaks that this is what you're getting at,
27:52
is the steaks of the Nightmare before Christmas? Is Christmas could die?
27:56
Because Jack Skelington didn't stay in his lane, and that's like, oh my
28:00
gosh, that on my DVD cover. Now Jack couldn't stay in his lane.
28:06
Christmas is in jeopardy. But James and the Giant Peach is a very
28:11
very small story in terms of what the stakes are for James. Coraline is
28:17
a very personal stakes, but it could become larger if maybe it really is
28:26
the real issue that I'm trying to fumble through here? Is that to your
28:32
point, I don't know what to feel like what I made reference to inside
28:36
out before inside Out even though I never moved growing up, I could still
28:41
relate to I'm becoming a teenager and I feel like my parents doesn't understand me
28:47
anymore. I don't know what's going on with my emotions. Everything's out of
28:51
control. Friendships are falling like it's it's oh my gosh, is this what
28:55
growing up is like? Anybody can plug into that. This does not have
29:00
that component. To your point, this is just a trip through, And
29:04
yes there's a Wizard of Oz element of your fantasy isn't always what you want?
29:11
Yeah, that's true, and sometimes there's something a little terrifying underneath it.
29:15
And maybe the best way to go about it is to make the best
29:19
of what you've got, because it's it's a bigger issue. Well there's than
29:26
what you think. And I don't know if the solution is, yeah,
29:30
make the stakes bigger, make it you know, once she takes the eyes
29:33
of four children, then she is unleashed upon the world and can turn it
29:38
into and take over our world. I don't know, right because like,
29:41
okay, let's say the other mother caught her. Well, now she's trapped
29:48
in the other world and her parents are still trapped, and the grandma's gonna
29:56
let the place out to a new person and they'll just be gone. Like
29:59
that's really what would have happened. That's what we would have and then maybe
30:02
that kid would have gotten taken as well. Like it just the cycle would
30:06
have continued, which is obviously bad. But yeah, it's an interesting take.
30:12
Well even layer on something like the grandmother knew but couldn't figure out how
30:18
to beat the other mother, and then Coraline is basically the one who figures
30:25
it out, and the grandmother can acknowledge she said, I've been waiting for
30:29
somebody to figure this out. But I mean, in all honesty, if
30:32
you really break it down. You could do one of those TikTok shorts of
30:34
the grandmother is really the real villain of this movie, right right, she
30:37
should just burn this house to the ground and be done with it. It's
30:41
like, sure, I know there's a curse on this house and if you're
30:44
a child, you will disappear. But hey, I need rent money,
30:48
so yeah, you know, and I'll have the completely unrelated, crazy acrobatic
30:55
neighbor up top do nothing. I don't know, why is he there?
31:00
I'm not entirely sure, right, well, yeah, and it's it's interesting
31:03
because Coraline is a good person. She she actually is kind to her neighbors
31:08
and YB and and and to you know, to her parents. I mean,
31:12
they don't have the best relationship, but but she's not a bad person.
31:17
I it's but I also get the allure of the other world because yeah,
31:23
she's like, look, they're making beautiful food, and everything's about me,
31:27
like she's her. If she has a flaw, it's vanity and selfishness.
31:33
Like there's definitely that aspect to her character. But at the end,
31:40
you know, she it's all about her parents. It's all about rescuing her
31:42
parents and bringing them back I don't know if a twist of her parents remembering
31:51
might have maybe helped the ending because the fact that like they don't like she's
31:56
like, oh, you have snow on you, Like, where's the snow
31:59
coming from? Mom? Like there's no snow anywhere. And then they're kind
32:02
of like just status quo, back to normal. And again maybe that's the
32:08
Wizard of Oz aspect of was it a dream, like oh you were there
32:12
and you were there or you were there, like there's a lot of that,
32:15
but I but it's all coreline growth. Her parents haven't really changed at
32:22
all. They've loosened up a tiny bit. But yeah, I agree with
32:27
that there's not enough of an emotional reconciliation at the end, which again I'm
32:32
gonna go ahead, I'm gonna make another reference to inside Out because at the
32:36
end, you have that moment where even though the parents have spent no time
32:39
inside this fictionalized brain, they come to a realization, Oh, we've had
32:45
a shortcoming here. You thought we didn't care, but we do and we
32:51
have to work on it. But we didn't realize our daughter was as impacted
32:54
by this move as we thought, like right, which we all get as
32:59
parents, like there's times we missed the mark and we're like, oh,
33:01
yeah, I did not realize. I thought everything was all good from the
33:05
outside, but inside it was not. And once you realize, and you're
33:08
a good parent, you you fix it. Well, well, once you're
33:14
you know, sometimes you can't fix it, but you try. Times I
33:16
should say, well, I mean, you at least try to address it.
33:20
Like once your kids hit teenage years, you start having some more open
33:23
discussions, and you know, you have moments where you say, look,
33:28
I've made the best call I could. I'm sorry it didn't go And that's
33:30
just the way it is, kid, you know, I did, I
33:34
made the best call I could with the info. I had to pull back
33:37
the curtain a little bit on the adult level decision because it is that.
33:42
But h and maybe, yeah, maybe her parents Oh man, now you
33:46
know, I'm kind of considering like if the parents had had that inside out
33:51
moment of oh, like you you like, we are kind of seeing you
33:58
again for the first time because they really like, she's barely even acknowledged in
34:01
the in their time, like they're kind of crappy to her. But like,
34:07
and the mom does buy the gloves and things like that. But if
34:09
they really had like a dinner chat, like sitting around the table being like,
34:14
hey, I know this move was hard. I know you left all
34:16
your friends, and but you know the book's doing well and like it's affording
34:23
us to hire a cook or something so I can spend time with you or
34:28
as something like that, like some happy moment. But we didn't really get
34:31
that. Like the movie was just over and we kind of you just it
34:37
was done. But and and it will never answer another question. And I'm
34:42
sorry to go down this rabbit hole, but boy, it completely really messed
34:45
with me in that I know how product placement works in live action film,
34:52
but the fact that they had a very clearly labeled Volkswagon as their car are
35:00
for some reason got under my skin. Was that the needle, yeah,
35:05
which came out I was right around then, if I remember correctly shortly before,
35:10
but like I just remember staring at the thing saying, is this a
35:15
product placement? Does he just really like Volkswagen? Is this in consideration of
35:20
funny? Like and for some reason, like I'm not a big fan of
35:24
it in movies to begin with. I mean, it is better to see
35:27
somebody eat a bag of Doritos instead of somebody that says chips on it.
35:30
It's like, come on, guys, super chips with flavor. It's like
35:32
okay, yeah, yeah, oh I love these nacho flavored trapezoids. But
35:38
like, for some reason, it just absolutely killed me that the Volkswagen logo
35:43
was on there, because it's like, you didn't even need to put it
35:45
on there. You could have had it looked like that, and you're gonna
35:47
be like that it's not a folks is a button? Yeah right, But
35:52
but it's like it's it's the same thing as like when I see somebody working
35:57
on a computer in like a stock shot or or you know, or something,
36:00
and all they did was they just put a sticker over the grass over
36:04
it. Yeah yeah, so bad. Yeah yeah. It's like okay,
36:07
that's I get it. I get it. I don't know why it got
36:09
under my skin. Were there any other product placements that I missed? Like?
36:15
Did I just fixate on that one? Because I think, really nuts?
36:19
They only go into town that one time, and it's like this downtown
36:22
drift store, But then why not just completely go hog wild and be like,
36:27
hey, Starbucks, you on a corner store here in Coraline's home town
36:30
give us fifty thousand dollars and it could be yours. I mean, like,
36:35
just go all in, man. Yeah, I don't get it.
36:37
I don't know. I don't know. I don't know why I fixate on
36:40
it, but I do. I do, and I mean, this is
36:45
another one where I really question whether I'm just being weird about the way I'm
36:51
watching it. Because it costs sixty million to make, it made me more
36:55
than eighty three domestic and one hundred and forty five worldwide, so it was
37:00
profitable. And it's rutten tomato score isn't like the nineties, like people liked
37:05
this movie. Wait a minute, where did you get your numbers? Because
37:07
because Wikipedia gives it a much smaller box office than that worldwide, it gave
37:14
it. Oh sorry, I met one twenty four, I missed typed Okay,
37:17
you are right correct? Yeah, all right, because well, no,
37:21
I would have been thrilled for them if they but doubling your budget's good,
37:23
right, right, that's good. And like you said, the critical
37:29
the critical response is pretty solid. You know. It wasn't by any means,
37:35
no, not by any stretch. It won a ton of awards.
37:38
It was nominated for a ton of awards. Everybody responded it really really well.
37:45
It was also released in three D. That's right, that's right,
37:49
and there are possible this just plays better in three D. This is somewhere
37:52
where the technology makes it pop. Could it also be that h three D
37:59
movie tickets or works, which also kind of helps pad your your winnings.
38:04
Great little point, especially in two thousand and nine, especially in two thousand
38:07
and nine. Yes, that was like a double the price of a ticket.
38:13
And there are moments like it's not terrible, but there are moments once
38:17
you know this was made in three D. You know, when the dad's
38:22
playing the piano and things are like unfolding out at you, like it's like,
38:27
okay that there are a few three D moments which again aren't It's not
38:31
too bad. If you didn't know it was three D, I don't think
38:36
it would. It might start to trigger your three D gag radar, but
38:40
it's it's not really that bad. But yeah, once you know it,
38:44
you're like, oh, yeah, well this shot, this shot, like
38:45
every time they go into the other world, there's some sort of moment of
38:50
something coming at the camera or getting really closed. So yeah it so it
38:54
did well and it's so funny. I mean, I feel like we're we're
38:59
kind of not talking to circles, but like we obviously enjoyed this movie overall,
39:06
but we're kind of scratching our heads, like it is not a oh
39:10
man, I sure know what number I'm giving it right off the bat,
39:15
Like, No, we got to kind of unpack it a bit. Yeah,
39:19
this is definitely one that's sort of a roller coaster in terms of there
39:22
were moments where, like there was twenty minutes where I was like, maybe
39:24
I love this movie, and then there'd be twenty minutes immediately after where I
39:29
said, Nope, love is not the word I'm looking for right now,
39:30
right but hate never keen to me. No, no, no no.
39:37
But I mean I gotta ask. In terms of the music, did the
39:40
music strike you as anything special? I had to look it up. So
39:45
Bruno, mister Bruno did the I think it's Kola last name. I looked
39:51
up and I could not recognize a single other work that he had done.
39:54
It's definitely and I mostly am struck by kind of the singing. You know,
40:01
there's that moment where she's got the dowling rod and you know, just
40:07
which is fun. It's kind of fantastical. It's kind of like, you
40:10
know, it's just a little girl wandering around her new home like it.
40:15
The music I think is spot on for the moment. I mean, there's
40:20
no songs. I don't want songs. I'm not saying we're comparing it too
40:23
much to James and to Nightmare, but I don't really need the cat to
40:30
have a solo where he sings about the dangers of buttons, you know,
40:34
I think that would have taken just too much, not for this type of
40:37
story. Yeah, but now I enjoyed it. I think it worked out
40:43
well. I guess there was a little bit of songs. Honestly. The
40:45
weirdest part, the weirdest, weirdest part was the other actresses, Like that
40:52
was almost a bit too far, where I'm like, what is going on,
40:57
Like they're singing this stage play and they got their dead bat dogs,
41:02
and yes, it was like that was a bit much to me. But
41:07
those were the moments that I loved in the sense that even though I agree
41:13
that doesn't play, I don't really it's the whimsy is the only reason it's
41:19
in there. It is, but I love whimsy as a rule, so
41:22
I'm like, it's one of those things where I can go either way with
41:24
it. And the moment where things get a little bit weird and it goes
41:30
a little bit mister Ogie Boogie's Layer and things start having as brightly glowing neon
41:35
colors, I'm like, Okay, all right, I'm back in a place
41:37
I really like, and I think it's just that it just never meshes the
41:45
way that it should. But musically, I think that is sort of a
41:49
glue that kept me with it because I thought the cues were very strong.
41:54
Can I really recall anything? Am I walking out? I'm like, I'm
41:58
gonna get a Bruno kule A discography, No I No. I am interested
42:04
to see what happens with Wendell and Wild next week because that'll be interesting because
42:08
obviously Selick felt that he got the composer that he wanted this time, because
42:14
we all know that with James and the Giant Peach, he was pushed around
42:15
by Disney. Yeah, he did not want uh Newman. So yeah,
42:21
so the but the big thing is, I think the ultimate question with this
42:24
is Disney's pushing him around on James and the Giant Peach and he doesn't have
42:29
his Tim. He doesn't have a Tim Burton there with him right now.
42:32
He's set free, now he's gotten what he wished for, and Disney is
42:37
not hanging over him. So what, well, we've done the substantial difference
42:43
in the result. Yeah, and we've talked about it before with other directors,
42:45
like I think of Lucas and like, we've talked many times about that
42:50
opposition force. But like you also said, like Tim Burton's, it's like
42:54
a combination. You want some sort of opposition force to make you commit to
43:00
the best decision, but you also need something pushing you to make the best
43:06
work, you know. So again, I think you kind of nailed something
43:10
on the number of times she visits and the overall flow there. It made
43:16
me think of the story around the first edit of Star Wars and how they
43:24
they attack the Desk star twice. Like they get in their ships, go
43:30
fly, do the trench run. It doesn't work, They leave, come
43:34
back to the planet, have another discussion, they're getting closer, they get
43:38
back in their shit, and I'm like, I cannot imagine that actually being
43:43
in the movie. That sounds atrociously planned out. But that's how over say
43:49
was so well tightening it up to I mean, but see that. I
43:53
mean like with something like that, it's a you know, a work print
43:57
is never even close to true. They are just throwing everything together and then
44:00
they sit down and like, oh, yeah, that didn't work at all.
44:04
Like it it's never going to be that. But more to this,
44:08
I think if you take the work print philosophy, I think you get back
44:12
to that. I'd love to find out if they used animatics, because I
44:15
think animatics are where you lay it out and with a work like this,
44:20
because you know what you're committing to in terms of creating all of the stuff,
44:24
animating all of the stuff once you graduate beyond Wallace and Grammut. Short
44:29
film but short enough that you know it's gonna work, and Wallace and Grammat
44:35
works incredibly well because it is, it's short enough for it to be gags.
44:42
Yeah, gags work at a short level. There's no gags in this
44:46
one. I mean not that it needs to have gags, but it's it's
44:52
like, what even what sub genre would you give this? Like animation?
44:57
The there are parts of this that would make me want to label it body
45:01
horror, because there is a very strong aspect of that that just really was
45:08
on. You know, it didn't like scare me or thrill me, but
45:12
it was one of those things where I was like, I don't like what
45:14
I'm watching right now, Like I don't like, oh, we're going to
45:16
sew this to your eye, like once you get to the whole, like
45:19
I'm going to sew this to your eyes thing. It's like, eh,
45:23
yeah, I'm not comfortable with what's happening right here. But that thing that
45:27
no child wants? What about this? Okay? Okay? Or even when
45:30
you have like the disembodied needle hand running around like a spider, that type
45:36
of stuff, I'm like, I think if anything there's a little bit too
45:40
much over correction for that, then anything else. The best fairy tales have
45:49
an element of terror about them. Hanseling, Gretel, Goldilocks, Little Red
45:55
riding Hood, there is an element of terror about them, but there yeah,
46:00
there's a purpose to all of the terror, whereas maybe this is a
46:04
part of the adaptation. But the hand running out that just feels like horror
46:08
movie. The villain isn't dead right, it does, it does, it
46:13
doesn't feel purposeful enough. And so that's the sort of thing where I think,
46:15
if you sit there and you don't. You haven't anime, you haven't
46:17
stopped motion animated it, but you watch it in the animatic. I think
46:21
that's a decision you take back and go. You know, that doesn't play
46:23
as well as I thought. Let's just have her get away and then we
46:27
can be able to an emotional be to the parents. Yeah, is her
46:30
goal is to get back home because now she realizes the value of what she
46:34
had. That is the ultimate arc is that she didn't value what she had,
46:38
which wasn't great, but it wasn't terrible. And then she goes into
46:44
this magical world and is like, oh, look at all this magical stuff.
46:46
It's you know, look how much better it is over here. All
46:49
you have to do is give up your eyes again. Really weird. But
46:53
then she realizes, oh, it's not all candies and rainbows and stuff like
46:58
that. So I got to get back home, get back home, and
47:01
yeah, give those moments to the parents for parent payoff. I think that
47:06
would have worked better. Yeah, you know, and it's tough because I
47:12
feel like we're kind of kicking Selic a little bit in the last two episodes,
47:16
but I'm ready to give my reading. Well, do we want to
47:21
give our ratings first, or do we want to phone a friend first?
47:24
You know what, I'm glad you asked that, Darren, because I think
47:27
we'll phone a friend, Because even though he was unable to join us because
47:31
of some top secret missions that he's on becoming bionic, I know that Tristan
47:37
sent a coded message to us, and with your permission, I'll go ahead
47:42
and read what he wrote. By all means, so, Tristan, given
47:46
everything we've talked about, how do you feel about Coraline by Henry Selick?
47:52
And Tristan's response is I was all set to record a podcast with John and
47:57
Darren this weekend, but fate, mixed with gravity had other plans. I
48:01
fell off a ladder, well I fell on the ladder. Either way,
48:06
I ended up with bloody legs, busted ribs, and a bruised ego.
48:10
As I lay there on the ground clutching my tenderized ribs, I knew there
48:15
was no way I could go ahead with the podcast. I'd laugh too much
48:19
at John and Darreon's hijinks and the pain would be unbearable, much like John's
48:22
impersonation attempts. So if I had to rate my evening's events, it would
48:28
be two and a half stars, just like the stop motion film core line.
48:30
The animation was undeniably beautiful, much like the potential of our podcast,
48:36
but it couldn't make up for the lack of a coherent story, just like
48:39
the lack of me and our recording tonight period. Now, obviously Tristan's in
48:44
a lot of pain to take a shot at my impersonations because I consider them
48:47
top notch. If anything, they're five stars, and I you know what,
48:52
we wish Tristan a speedy recovery and not to take so much eyburprofen because
48:58
obviously it's affecting its judgment in areas. But he gave it two and a
49:01
half start. You found a way to argue with Tristed we is not even
49:05
here. That's amazing, not just argue, but when because it just comes
49:09
naturally. So there you go. Okay, so two and a half,
49:14
I mean I was expecting that, Like I I don't know, just maybe
49:17
it's the hundreds of episodes we've done together that I could usually kind of get
49:23
a bead. What is my running joke? It's either a Tristed Riddell family
49:28
favorite or like they never watch it. Ever, it's very little in between,
49:34
so I knowing, And he had also said to us before that he
49:37
had seen this previously more when it came out and had not gotten it and
49:43
wanted to give it another shake, kind of like my viewing. So I'm
49:45
like, based off of my viewing, I don't think yes, even with
49:50
that second shake, I totally see a two point five for him, that
49:53
makes sense. I'll go next to I think for me, yeah, I'm
50:00
I'm going to give it a two. I mean I gave James a two.
50:05
I think it's I can't give it a three, maybe because I really
50:12
don't see rewatching this very often at all. If there was a behind the
50:16
scenes documentary on this, I would watch that in a heartbeat. I would
50:21
love to see the making of this movie. I think that would be amazingly
50:24
interesting. But you know, again we've said several times, or I've said
50:30
sometimes like the the I'm gonna say stop motion. But just the world,
50:35
the built characters and creatures and locations are gorgeous, like it's you know,
50:39
heads and tails beyond. You can see the technology moving, you can see
50:45
every dollar of that budget on screen. It is there. But the story
50:51
just didn't grab me. It's not it's not going to be a Moser family
50:55
favorite for sure, which isn't a curse of death. But I'm going to
51:00
give it a two. What about what about you done? I'm going to
51:04
wind up being a little bit nicer with it because I have to tip the
51:08
hat to the craft involved. It's absolutely stunning what they pull off here.
51:15
Uh, And I think that even more interesting as you look at James and
51:19
the giant peach and then you look at this and you see where computers are
51:22
aiding it now, and additionally with a three D obviously the layering of different
51:28
elements is occurring. The way you would shoot it is different, but it's
51:32
still so practical or it has practical elements. Yeah, and so it's a
51:37
really interesting sort of bridge piece where you look at it and you say,
51:43
wow, they're still doing it the hard way, but they're at least processing
51:49
it more in a more straightforward fashion, or in a more efficient fashion,
51:54
I should say. So technically, I think it's just absolutely brilliant. In
52:00
terms of story, I have problems engaging, but then there are moments where
52:04
I love what's going on. So I wind up like Tristan with a two
52:08
and a half. I want to give it a three so bad. I
52:13
really want to give it a three. But at the end of it all,
52:17
I just didn't get the emotional payoff that I felt was necessary for this
52:23
to have gelled. And there you go, that's just the way it's gonna
52:27
be. Yeah, I think if I gave half scores, I would probably
52:30
give it a two and a half as well. It's it. It was
52:32
on the edge because, like you said, I mean, I feel like
52:37
I've said this gorgeous movie many times in this recording, but just the things
52:42
that they put on screen and the amount of stuff and the scale like that
52:46
garden had to have been massive. I think it was like a forty foot
52:52
like wide area. Like I think they had many sound stages, but they
52:55
made fifty lots that for this movie. And it again it's all on the
53:00
screen. They have so much there so uh and I think that's what really
53:07
made you know. When you look at the production company, which I'm blanking
53:12
on the name, but it's like late Lake Lakia. I don't have it
53:19
begins with the mind, but it's Laca or Laka or something like that.
53:24
Yeah, but you can see that they're just progressing every single time. Every
53:29
movie it is, it's It's Laka Panoni. Yeah, so I think,
53:36
yeah, it makes me really and I and I've seen other things that they've
53:38
done, like Kubo in the Tooth Strings and I didn't catch missing link.
53:44
That one didn't really get me into theaters. But but yeah, we we
53:50
have a great last her foray into Henry Selick with Wendel and Wild. We're
53:57
doing another jump next week as we go from two thousand and nine to twenty
54:00
twenty two, just last year at the time of this recording. That's going
54:06
to be wild. I'm sure next time here on Houselights, Join the Revolution,
54:13
Join the Nerd Party.