We all have movies we like to watch around this time of year.
Macabre stories about ghosts and monsters that help us enjoy the Halloween season.
My go-tos are "The Nightmare Before Christmas", "Beetlejuice", and "Halloweentown High".
But if I were to ask you some of your favorite Halloween movies,
undoubtedly some of you would say "Coraline",
the 2009 stop-motion adaptation of the middle grade book by Neil Gaiman.
And I had actually not consumed either of these until this month,
which I know is unusual given that I love animation
AND it's got the same director as "The Nightmare Before Christmas",
Henry Selick.
"Coraline" is about a young girl named…
Coraline,
who has just moved into a new apartment with her inattentive parents.
She's got some weird neighbors but she's a bit bored in her new surroundings.
But then she discovers a door in her living room that leads to an altered version of her own world,
constructed by a horrible monster that wants to trap her there forever.
But Coraline defeats the monster and rescues her kidnapped parents!
Before we get started, it's important to note that the book and the movie are not the same story.
Though they do share the premise I just described, the characters, themes, and messages are all
quite different from each other.
In a funny sort of way, these separate works are an uncanny version of each other,
much like the slanted world Coraline finds in the book.
The book is a story about maturation and identity,
while the movie is a story about temptation and deception.
deception the book is more focused on character and the movie on adventure
that doesn't make one bad and one good it just means that they're different in
fact they're so different that a straight book versus movie comparison
doesn't really work for example the other world in the book is certainly
more interesting but it's creepy and uncanny from the beginning and it makes
Coraline feel uncomfortable so she leaves in the movie the Otherworld is a
bright and exciting paradise that appeals to the shortcomings in Coraline
zone life and Coraline wants to stay there until the button incident no these
two settings are so different from each other that you can't really say that one
is objectively better than the other though you can absolutely have a
preference and for the sake of honesty I preferred
the book but I'm not just gonna sit here and tell you guys how the movie is worse
because it didn't do everything the book did I think that would be kind of silly
given that different isn't synonymous with better that being said let's talk
about why I hated YB with a passion of a thousand unnecessary banana slugs we're
hunting banana slugs why born love it why B for short is an adorable geeky kid
the same age as Coraline he was created for the movie and in a word YB is
unnecessary Celicas needed a few different times that he wrote YB in so
that Coraline wouldn't just be wandering around talking to herself the whole time
for the time being we're going to ignore the fact that this sounds vaguely
misogynistic his answer seems like a legitimate concern for a book with a
single hero until you realize that there are nearly 20 characters that coralline
interacts with in the book which is a lot sure Coraline is alone sometimes in
the book but she's also alone in the movie and she talks to herself so
mission not accomplished I don't know SELEX answer doesn't really
hold up at all because of that but this video would be a lot shorter if I just
stopped it there and I'm not gonna I have a lot more to say about YT
ultimately it doesn't matter if YB was actually stuck in this story to ensure
boys would watch a movie about a female heroine or not what matters is that YB
does not serve any purpose in this story if he was interesting I'd probably cut
him some slack but he's just not I don't think it would be fair to say that Y be
a symbolic of all of my problems with this movie but
he's a pretty big chunk not gonna lie and it's not his personality that
bothers me the movie actually really wants you to like and empathize with him
I think a lot more than it wants you to like Coraline
it's how he exists and alters the story that bothers me for the sake of fairness
let's look at the one interesting thing that why he brings to the movie his
great-aunt why Bea's grandmother mrs. Lovett owns the house Coraline lives in
and we learned that when she was a little girl her sister disappeared in
that house later we learned that the other mother snatched her because duh
she's the doll shown in the opening credits and one of the ghost kids
Coraline meets this is an interesting thread and it has the potential to be an
emotionally compelling subplot but there's no real intrigue because
absolutely no one who is on screen for more than five seconds cares about the
answer to this mystery I'm not kidding Whitey's grandmother on screen for five
seconds and because of that there's no payoff there's no reason for it it's
such a small part of the story that it's pretty easy to forget it's even a thing
and the movie doesn't really do enough with it to justify its existence in the
narrative kind of like YV besides Coraline and the other mother why he has
the most physical presence in the story which is weird because there isn't
really a place for him in this story he just sits on top of an already robust
and complete cast appearing only when he needs to further the story in some way
much like those in the other world are instruments of the Bell down YB is an
instrument of the plot he is exposition a savior a filler scene
he is pushed and shoved and patted into any cracks and holes the story needs to
fill he's essentially plot buddy and what's hilarious is that the movie tries
to turn him into a main character and the movie does this by having him sponge
relevant dialogue in action from the other characters leaving everyone a bit
duller as a result he reduces the presence of the cat and the other father
the most which is very disappointing because the
cat is actually really awesome and in the book he Coraline have this
interesting camaraderie ah but that's beside the point
from a writing standpoint his creation makes no sense
it doesn't make sense to downgrade other characters to build a new and lackluster
one you're supposed to do the opposite especially when the cast is as big as it
is in Coraline what bothers me more than anything else about the cobbled nature
of Y B is how he fundamentally changes Coraline as a result in the book
Coraline is a very clever assured resourceful and observant girl she's
brave and she likes to explore she's kind and compassionate to those who need
help but above all else she is self-reliant she receives help
but nobody has to save her and yet with the addition of Y B Coraline
self-reliance is practically non-existent
YV tells her world her well is it's his delivery of the doll rather than her
discovery of the door that kicks the plot into motion the other version of
him saves her from the mirror and helps her escape the world the cat has to tell
Coraline the other mother is dangerous and he only knows that because the other
why he told me so the one that axe me the most is that in the book she sets a
deliberate trap to dispose of the hand forever but this is scrapped in the
movie so that YB can dramatically ride in on his mountain bike and save her
it's it makes me so angry it's laughable Coraline is also her meanest and most
unlikable when she's around Y B because she hates him for some reason I mean
she's just dramatically mean to him like dr. o I do want to mention that
there's some really weird ablest coding present and his character he has a
hunched back he stutters he rarely looks at Coraline straight on he has odd
interests he has a bit of a gait and he's often nervous during simple social
interaction this makes the insults coralline directs
at him especially cringe-worthy I think I heard someone calling you why born
what I didn't hear you I definitely heard someone why were you born
damn Coraline was that even necessary why he is such an odd character from the
way the movie treats him to his function to just how out of place he is all of
that being said I don't think why he makes Coraline a bad movie the animation
is gorgeous and the voice acting is fantastic and I did enjoy the film it's
not one of my favorites and I think that it would have been much stronger without
ye but that doesn't mean it's a bad movie regardless of this writing gap I
think we can all agree that if you're looking to traumatize children this
Halloween season Coraline is definitely the way to go
just wanted to wish you all a happy Halloween I was really excited to have
some spooky themed content for you guys I also just wanted to reiterate that if
you really like this movie that's okay I'm not attacking you and I hope you
enjoyed the video regardless I'd also be really interested to know your opinion
in the comments have you read the book do you have a preference to having
strong feelings about why be and subscribe to the princess and
description are for more videos on Disney intersectional feminist some pop
culture critiques and d'amore the princess we'll see you next week
I'm not saying the Halloween tell movies are high-caliber filmmaking but they are
so freaking spoopy I love it just not that last one
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