Review by Bob Ignizio
Norman (Kodi
Smit-McPhee) sees dead people. Lots of them. All around the town of Blithe Hollow,
the spirits of those who died violently or otherwise have reasons for
not yet moving on converse with the glum adolescent who gets bullied
at school for being a freak only to come home to a father who doesn't
understand him. At least Grandma accepts Norman as he is, but
unfortunately she's dead.
As is
often the case in kid flicks like this, Norman's curse turns out to
be a blessing in disguise. The spirit of a witch who was put to death
hundreds of years ago put a curse on the town. Norman's Uncle Mr.
Prenderghast has been keeping this supernatural vengeance at bay for
years, but it's clear that won't go on much longer. So it falls on
Norman to use his ability to talk to the dead to try and save the
very people who ridicule him.
Look,
we all know how this is going to turn out; it's a kid's movie, after
all. Nothing too bad is going to happen. It's not the destination
that matters, but how much fun we have getting there, and PARANORMAN
provides its audience with more than sufficient fun from the opening
zombie movie parody on through to the inevitable “believe in
yourself” moral at the end. I would have loved this as a kid, and I
imagine the more macabre minded youngsters of today will dig it as
well.
PARANORMAN
even has something to offer for the adults. Without being too overt
about it, the film pays homage to seventies drive-in/grindhouse
zombie flicks from the get go. While much of the soundtrack is
orchestral, whenever some supernatural threat rears its head,
throbbing seventies synths get added to the mix. The plotting is
still about as slapdash as it usually is in most of these CGI kiddie
flicks, but there's a genuine heart beating underneath it all and
enough clever gags that it's worth a watch. 2 1/2 out of 4 stars.
I might have to take PJ to check out this one :). We did love Coraline.
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