Coraline A Closer Look at Studio LAIKA’s Stop-Motion Witchcraft
Produktdetaljer
Biografisk notat
Mihaela Mihailova is Assistant Professor in the School of Cinema at San Francisco State University. She has published in Journal of Cinema and Media Studies, [in]Transition,Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies, Feminist Media Studies, animation: an interdisciplinary journal, Studies in Russian and Soviet Cinema, Flow, and Kino Kultura. She has also contributed chapters to Animating Film Theory (with John MacKay), Animated Landscapes: History, Form, and Function, The Animation Studies Reader, and Drawn from Life: Issues and Themes in Animated Documentary Cinema. Dr. Mihailova is the co-editor of Animation Studies and currently serves as Secretary of the Society for Animation Studies<i>Coraline: A Closer Look at Studio LAIKA’s Stop-Motion Witchcraft</i> is an exciting collection and a much welcome contribution to animation studies. The essays address <i>Coraline</i> from a range of perspectives, collectively positioning it as a key LAIKA feature and a landmark in stop-motion history. A great read for all animation enthusiasts.
Filipa Antunes, Lecturer in Humanities, University of East Anglia, UK
Henry Seleck’s masterpiece <i>Coraline</i> endures as a haunted and haunting exploration of the adolescent trauma of coping with emerging competing identities. It is also vastly entertaining and technically brilliant. Mihailova leads her band of witchery-finders on a quest to expose the alchemy behind the film. They explore the sophisticated stop-motion technology of the LAIKA studio (state-of-the-art, yet harking back to the earliest days of cinema), the labyrinthine passages of meaning and interpretations honeycombed within the narrative, and its myriad cultural references and resonances. Throughout, the book echoes Mihailova’s thesis that <i>Coraline </i>succeeds not only as one of the best stop-motion films ever, but also, reflexively, as a rich work that self-challenges its own animated creation.
Donald Crafton, Joseph and Elizabeth Robbie Professor Emeritus of Film, Television, and Theater, University of Notre Dame, USA
This open access collection brings together an international group of practitioners and scholars to examine Coraline’s place in animation history and culture, dissect its politics, and unpack its role in the technological and aesthetic development of its medium.
Coraline (Henry Selick, 2009) is stop-motion studio LAIKA's feature-length debut based on the popular children's novel by British author Neil Gaiman. Heralding a revival in global interest in stop-motion animation, the film is both an international cultural phenomenon and a breakthrough moment in the technological evolution of the craft. This book celebrates stop motion as a unique and enduring artform while embracing its capacity to evolve in response to cultural, political, and technological changes, as well as shifting critical and audience demands.
Divided into three sections, this volume’s chapters situate Coraline within an interconnected network of historical, industrial, discursive, theoretical, and cultural contexts. They place the film in conversation with the medium’s aesthetic and technological history, broader global intellectual and political traditions, and questions of animation reception and spectatorship. In doing so, they invite recognition – and appreciation – of the fact that Coraline occupies many liminal spaces at once. It straddles the boundary between children’s entertainment and traditional ‘adult’ genres, such as horror and thriller. It complicates a seemingly straight(forward) depiction of normative family life with gestures of queer resistance. Finally, it marks a pivotal point in stop-motion animation’s digital turn. Following the film’s recent tenth anniversary, the time is right to revisit its production history, evaluate its cultural and industry impact, and celebrate its legacy as contemporary stop-motion cinema’s gifted child.
As the first book-length academic study of this contemporary animation classic, this volume serves as an authoritative introduction and a primary reference on the film for scholars, students, practitioners, and animation fans.
The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com.
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Coraline: A Twitchy, Witchy Girl in Stop-Motion Land
Mihaela Mihailova (University of Michigan, USA)
Part 1: Historical Contexts and Perspectives
Chapter 1: Drawing Coraline: Illustration, Adaptation, and Visuality
Malcolm Cook (University of Southampton, UK)
Chapter 2: Mixing it Up: Coraline and LAIKA’s Hybrid World
Miriam Harris (Auckland University of Technology, New Zealand)
Chapter 3: Armatures in the Closet: Coraline and the History of Stop Motion
Mihaela Mihailova (University of Michigan, USA)
Chapter 4: The Surprising Migrations of 2 ½ D: The Background to Coraline
Norman M. Klein (California Institute of the Arts, USA)
Part 2: Stop-Motion Technology, Process, and Spectatorship
Chapter 5: Replacing Coraline
Dan Torre (RMIT University, Australia)
Chapter 6: Coraline’s ‘Other World’: The Animated Camera in Stop-Motion Feature Films
Jane Shadbolt (The University of Newcastle, Australia)
Chapter 7: A World within Reach: A Neuroanimatic Perspective on Themes of Threat in the Miniature World of Coraline
Ann Owen (Falmouth University, UK)
Chapter 8: Darkness and Delight: The Reception of Coraline in the USA and UK
Rayna Denison (University of East Anglia, UK)
Part 3: Puppet Politics: Ideology, Identity, Representation
Chapter 9: The Other Maiden, Mother, Crone(s): Witchcraft, Queer Identity, and Political Resistance in LAIKA's Coraline
Mx. Kodi Maier (University of Hull, UK)
Chapter 10: Becoming-Puppet: Failed Interpellation and the Uncanny Subjection in Coraline
Eric Herhuth (Tulane University, USA)
Chapter 11: The Wandering Child and the Family in Crisis in Henry Selick’s Coraline
Jane Batkin (University of Lincoln, UK)
Chapter 12: Fa(r)ther Figures: Locating the Author Father in Coraline
Nicholas Andrew Miller (Loyola University Maryland, USA)
Index
The volumes in the Animation: Key Films/Filmmakers series aim to both prompt and collect current and critical scholarship surrounding the work of selected animated films and filmmakers. Each volume focuses on the work of a specific film or filmmaker, situating the film or filmmaker within historical and critical contexts. The volumes are the first substantial study on the key films and filmmakers in question, contributing to the development of animation studies as a significant area of study in the contemporary media landscape.
Editorial Board:
Maureen Furniss (Director, Experimental Animation, CalArts, USA)
Joao Paulo Amaral Schlittler Silva (University of Sao Paulo, BRAZIL)
Sara Khalili (Tehran University of Art, IRAN)
Hannes Rall (Nanyang Technological University, SINGAPORE)
Charles DaCosta (Swinburne University of Technology, AUSTRALIA)
Lisa Bode (University of Queensland, AUSTRALIA)
Marie Pruvost-Delaspre (University Paris 8 Vincennes Saint Denis, FRANCE)
Akshata Udiaver (Founder & Editor: All About Animation, INDIA)
Franziska Brucker (University of Vienna, AUSTRIA)
Christopher Holliday (Kings College London, UK)
Debjani Mukherjee (Unitedworld Institute of Design, Ahmedabad, INDIA)
Mihaela Mihailova (University of Michigan, USA)