Yet another old thread - sorry guys
In my opinion,
Coraline is the greatest 3D film ever made. I say "3D film" because as far as I'm concerned, that's what it is, and it's the very best example of the genre.
I mean, 3D can certainly be gimmicky. I'm sure that some of the first "talkie" films or colour movies were gimmicky too. And yes, I know what it felt like when piranhas were being batted towards the camera in the 3D remake of
Journey to the Centre of the Earth. But I honestly believe that the 3D in
Coraline - rain on the window, that stretching tunnel, the garden flyover - is as important as its use colour. The 3D
adds to the movie.
The most beautiful 3D moments, predictably, take place in the other world. The mouse circus, the garden, the scene behind the mirror, and the insect-themed living room all glow eerily, to the extent where watching
Coraline is sometimes like being immersed in a glow-in-the-dark hologram. I honestly can't think of a cinema experience like it.
The plot could be better, but I read the book a while ago, and emphatically blame the source material. It's all too arbitrary. Why would the Beldam want to remove your eyes and put buttons in their place? Why would taking your eyes away turn you into some kind of lost soul, and how would retrieving the eyeballs free you from limbo? Neil Gaiman is quite annoying in the novel, because he exudes this smug aura of one who feels that he has mastered the dream logic of the fairytale. I mean sure - there's a mental place where it seems perfectly natural that you might have to spin straw from gold or sleep for hundreds of years, but Neil Gaiman doesn't quite get there.
I blame the critics for pandering to him in this regard. They all mention the buttons/ eyes thing in a slightly hushed tone of awe, as if the maestro of fairytale horror is running his fingers up and down their spines as they try to write their copy. Ultimately, the buttons gimmick isn't big and clever. It's extraordinarily basic. It plays on a very obvious fear of having something sharp near your eyes (the needle) and incorporates some of the musty odds-and-ends of your Grandmother's spare room (the buttons) without making enough sense to ever feel authentic. Rumpelstilskin feels like he crawled out of mankind's collective subconsciousness, whereas Neil Gaiman's Beldam feels like a fraud.
Anyway - since the film is so much better than the book, and since I went to see it (and enjoyed it) primarily as a 3D spectacular, I won't mark it down for that. It bugged me in the book but not in the slightest here. The film's faults are all Neil Gaiman's, but its magnificent virtues are its own.
In short, everything that happens visually and audibly is a real treat, from the self-playing piano (that, eerily, begins to play the "other father" later in the film) to the hypnotic mouse circus. Other highlights include the "after hours" return to Spink and Forcible's taffy-themed theatre and the early tour of the new house. I found my first screening so magical that I actually went back on my own a few times to catch it again, and each repeat performance was as magical as the first. In fact, I think that's the first time I've ever made a point of deliberately returning to the cinema, rather than seeing a film multiple times for purely social reasons.
As far as I'm concerned, that's proof that 3D cinema can compete with home entertainment after all!
