The Creepiest Children’s Horror Movie On Streaming Is Nightmare Fuel For All Ages
Truly unsettling horror movies don’t always have to include gruesome kills like those found in the Terrifier series, the grotesque imagery of a David Cronenberg film, or the jumpscares of Scream; they can, in fact, be wonderfully animated and colorful, as is the case with Coraline. It can be hard to explain to someone who hasn’t seen the film just how disturbing the film gets, but that’s part of what makes it so great and a fantastic introduction to horror. The tale of a young girl who stumbles into another world starts off gently, but like a frog in a boiling pot of water, viewers realize too late what they’re about to experience.
Gothic Horror For Kids
Coraline is a bored 11-year-old girl who discovers a strange passage in her family’s new home that leads her to a world just like her own, except here, her parents pay attention to her, smother her with love, and everyone has odd buttons over their eyes. The “Other World” is filled with temptations to get her to stay, and her “Other Mother” makes that offer, except to stay, she has to have buttons sewed over her eyes. It’s honestly not much of an offer, and it’s very obvious that the “Other Mother” is up to no good, but this isn’t a mystery; it’s gothic horror.
Gothic horror focuses on the macabre and the unsettling sensation that something isn’t quite right, and the change in the animation, lighting, and color palette between the real world and the “Other World” captures that feeling of unease before you see how everyone’s doppelganger acts “off.” Coraline eventually introduces ghosts, another staple of the genre, before it all comes together for a happy ending.
The truly unsettling part of Coraline isn’t the visuals, but the temptation, knowing that the “Other World” is wrong, but you can feel how the young girl is weighing her options and thinking about it. Beyond the supernatural and macabre, gothic horror is all about heightened emotion and passion that drowns out all common sense, and that’s what is disturbing about this story. We know it’s dangerous, we know it’s wrong, and Coraline knows the same, but there’s still that small part that thinks, “But what if?”
Handcrafted Horror Puppetry
Though the unsettling environment and strong story of Coraline have helped it develop a lasting fan base, the visuals definitely help. Animated by Laika, the studio that was originally founded by legendary animator Will Vinton, the stop-motion style imagery heightens the sense of unreality that pervades the whole film. Though aided by CGI imagery, thousands of models were made for the film, with over a hundred physical sets built to support the elaborate puppetry at work behind not only the main characters but even the background elements, from dancing flowers to creepy paintings.
Coraline is an impressive showcase of practical special effects, but it’s also aided by the voice cast, which includes Dakota Fanning as Coraline and Teri Hatcher as both versions of her mother, joined by Judge John Hodgman, Keith David, and Ian McShane. But most impressively, was the film’s dual re-releases this year, once during the summer, and again for Halloween, in which it made over $53 million. In 2024, 15 years after its original 2009 release.
Between the vivid, offputting but gorgeous visuals and the well-crafted story, Coraline has gone beyond being a cult classic to becoming the most successful stop-motion animated film of all time and an actual classic of cinema. If you ever wanted to introduce someone to horror, there’s no better film than this. Even if you’re an aficionado who has a favorite Michael Myers, it’s still a fun film that, at 100 minutes, is an easy watch that will stick with you longer after the credits roll.
Coraline is now streaming for free on Tubi.
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