The new 3D stop-motion comedy thriller from animation company LAIKA, reteaming the company with Focus Features after the groundbreaking Academy Award-nominated Coraline. ParaNorman is, following Coraline, the company’s second stop-motion animated feature to be made in 3D. In ParaNorman, a small town comes under siege by zombies. Who can it call? Only misunderstood local boy Norman (Kodi Smit-McPhee), who is able to speak with the dead. In addition to the zombies, he’ll have to take on ghosts, witches and, worst, of all, grown-ups, to save his town from a centuries-old curse. But this young ghoul whisperer may find his paranormal activities pushed to their otherworldly limits. — (C) Focus

As a fan of Coraline, I was pretty excited to see the new film from LAIKA. I love stop-motion films and this company is amazing at it. It would take so much patience to be an artist on a film like this. I hoped that ParaNorman would be as cool and as interesting as Coraline was.

Once again, LAIKA has created a very creative but very interesting and strange film. One of the thoughts that I had watching this movie is that it was The Sixth Sense for little kids. I will say that this was a scarier kids’ movie. I think it will definitely scare some younger children. Make sure you think about what your children can handle in the scary department. I thought that Coraline was creepy for some kids and this one is even more creepy. Sometimes, children like to be scared a little but this movie may be too much for some kids.

There are many reasons why this movie is a good film. The animation is very well done. There is amazing attention to detail. During the film, I was so engrossed in the world they created for Norman. It is amazing how much talent people have to make movies like this. The 3D also added some really good dimension to the film. The voice acting in this movie was fantastic. The actors really pulled out all the stops for this movie. The characters on screen seemed like real people, not just animated characters. I also thought the storytelling and humor in the film was great. I will say that I cannot believe how much adult humor was in this movie. Some of it definitely went over little kids’ heads and that was a good thing. ParaNorman also teaches a great message about accepting people for who they are, even if they are a little different.

ParaNorman is a great movie. Just know that it is a scary movie for some kids so I would make sure to evaluate if your children will be able to handle it.