COMMENT

On August 17, Focus Features and LAIKA, the companies behind the Academy Award-nominated animated feature “Coraline,” present the comedy thriller “ParaNorman.”

Long before director Chris Butler began work at LAIKA and was storyboard supervisor on the company’s “Coraline,” he had an idea for an original animated movie that he began to script. He notes, “There is a tradition of storyboard artists and supervisors becoming directors of animated movies; you make a movie first with the drawings, and then you make it again for real. I wanted to see my own story visualized, and in stop-motion.

“Writing ‘ParaNorman’ was a labor of love” Butler continues. “I wanted to do a zombie movie for kids – taking a ‘Scooby-Doo’ mystery to its logical conclusion, rather than having it be debunked – and there was also a ‘what if’ idea that had to do with my relationship with my grandma. So I combined them into a script that would be irreverent and full of adventure, and also be about identity. One of the themes of our movie is, ‘You can’t judge a book by its cover.’”

He elaborates, “It took 10 years for me to complete the script. I would dip in and out of it; I’d work all day on someone else’s movie and then come home and relax by writing the script. So ‘ParaNorman’ – which at first had no real title, just ‘Zombie Movie Something’ – was a long time coming.”

Producer Arianne Sutner came aboard early on, before the script was even finished. She reflects, “Stories about an outsider kid and stories about monsters have had a universal and timeless appeal, but this one was going to be like no other we had seen. What impressed me about [Butler’s] writing was how he conceived the movie as being for and about kids, without talking down to them, and how it also spoke to parents like myself; Chris shows how Norman faces his fears and makes peace with the special gift that he has.”

Sutner, whose stop-motion experience had included collaborating with “Coraline” director Henry Selick for over a decade, worked with Butler to further develop the script. She notes, “Stop-motion is such a beautiful way to make movies, and one that evolves as a truly collaborative effort beginning even in the script development phase. Because of the medium, and [Butler’s] own story department experience, we focused a lot on visual exploration in addition to the pacing and the structure.”

At LAIKA, producer Travis Knight read the unfinished script. He acknowledges “seeing a lot of myself and my kids in Norman,” and therefore being curious to see how the story would turn out. So, midway through production of “Coraline,” “ParaNorman” would be added to LAIKA’s development roster – and soon move to the forefront.

Sutner muses, “In the world of animation, nothing can happen very quickly – but getting this movie on track happened kind of quickly!”

Butler remembers, “The final pages, including the climax, had been all mapped out – coming from [the] story [department at LAIKA] myself, I knew how important that was – but were written during working on “Coraline.” Once that movie was finished, we went immediately into planning ‘ParaNorman;’ in fact, I haven’t had a proper vacation since ‘Coraline!’”

Sutner notes, “Chris [Butler] knew how he wanted what he had put on the page to live on-screen. I could tell that he had the strengths needed to realize his potential as a director, and I would tell him to trust his instincts. LAIKA is not the first animation studio to have a director come from its story department. But what sets them apart is that when they commit to a director, they are committing to the director’s vision. They had a lot of faith in Chris because he’s already a visual storyteller.”

Butler offers, “Other studios would have wanted to change it and do away with the challenging elements. But Travis [Knight] saw those challenges as a plus, and that right there is what makes LAIKA special; here we want to do material that is out of the ordinary– like Norman himself – and every step of the way here at LAIKA, Travis has encouraged me and my vision.”

For his part, director Sam Fell was encouraged enough to board the project in 2009. He notes, “I had recently seen ‘Coraline’ and thought LAIKA’s production was amazing and brave; it could not have happened anywhere else. I wanted to come and work with these people who were out to break new ground. The British wit of [Butler’s] script appealed to me. But what truly grabbed me was the central character of Norman, and the way he grows and changes. I believe it’s good for kids to know that it’s okay to be different, and to stand out a bit.”