Coraline is even creepier than you thought...

...because Coraline never leaves the Other World!

I already made a review and analysis of Coraline on Youtube many years ago and I also put it on Substack and I will link to it at the end of this article. So if you rather want to watch a review in video form, go check it out. But I do feel I wanted to kinda redo my review.

There is nothing wrong with my original review, I just felt I was rambling a little bit in the video and wanted to make an article that’s more to the point.

So here is the point; Coraline has got to be the most creepy movie EVER. And I don’t mean the creepiest kids movie or even the creepiest horror movie. It’s the most creepy movie period and I’ll explain why. Of course the original book by Neil Gaiman is even creepier, but here I’ll focus on the 2009 stop motion film.

The Beldam wants to remake Coraline into her little doll

Because what most people miss and what I tried to ultimately get at in my original review and what some other reviewers have since picked up, is that CORALINE NEVER ESCAPES the clutches of the Beldam. And of course on top of that there is a whole bunch of symbolism related to (sexual) abuse, manipulation and (sexual) grooming. And of course all the subtle occult and insect imagery which is mainly increasingly unsettling.

Many horror movies for adults such as the original Alien have the exact same symbolism, including the subtle and unsettling sexual abuse themes paired with occult and disgusting insect like imagery. But even Alien has a happy end - because Ripley isn’t just a victim of this symbolical abuse, but ultimately she is a survivor who at the end defeats the insect like monster. Which is actually why when my own abusive mother made me watch the Alien movie at 4 years old, it scared me to death, but it also gave me hope that even the worst abuse can be overcome and even the worst “monster” can be defeated. Which is why Alien is and always has been my favorite horror movie and actually scared me much less than when I watched Coraline 20 years later.

Both the "Other World" and the "real world" at the end have weather formations in the form of the Beldam's claws

Because unlike Ripley, Coraline is NOT a survivor and she does NOT defeat the “monster” at the end. I know it SEEMS that way, but not only is she being fooled and groomed and gas lid and deceived, but the audience is manipulated along with her, which if you can figure out what’s going on, just makes it even more creepy and bleak and hopeless and depressing. Especially when you realize that all this is based on and symbolical of real world child abuse and the tactics used by real life groomers…