Coraline Viewing Questions

Coraline. I've loved this movie since I first saw it in theaters my freshman year of college. At that time, I don't think I'd tacked on my Film & TV major yet, so I was "mainly just an English student", but I was taking a class in our communications school. I just remember seeing connections with Alice in Wonderland and wondering if this was some kind of modern adaptation of the story.

My first year teaching Film Studies to High School students, I decided to begin the year with Coraline. Though it may have made my Film Studies counterpart at that time cringe a bit. I believe I recall a passing statement about whether a stop motion film was "technically a film", but I didn't really care. After hearing over and over again complaints from students that "an author can't have planned all of those details," I could see the same comments of directors coming down my lane. If I were to show a stop motion film, where each scene and movement is carefully planned and captured, has to convey intention and purpose automatically, right?

My goals for teaching Coraline were:

• to assess how well students could notice patterns (motifs),
• craft theme statements that may or may not be supported by those patterns, and
• begin to learn and practice some film vocabulary.

The PDFs you can access here are viewing questions for the movie. One set of viewing questions is an update of what I've used in the past in my classes to meet the objectives I've just described above. Another set assumes that you might use the comprehension questions in a "regular English class," or one that isn't necessarily focused on laying a foundation for a year long course of Film Studies. And finally, just a "master list" of questions that you could pick and choose from as you see fit. If you're looking for a bit of an elaboration on how to teach with the movie, you can check out this blog post here.

Though I've admired and enjoyed the movie for a long time, it recently was brought back for some special viewing in theaters. I even noticed that Neil Gaiman, the author of the original story, mentions Coraline in an early lesson of his in Master Class. He talks about his journey writing the story, as well as some of the interactions he's had with readers where they share the impact Coraline has had on them.

Gaiman describes how he wanted to write a story about bravery for his children, after reflecting on what bravery really meant to him following an encounter with yellow jackets around his very small children at the time, and a dropped pair of glasses he had to go back for. While I certainly see and admire the example of bravery that Coraline offers, the movie also gives opportunity to discuss and explore:

• the nature of childhood versus adulthood / growing up
• fun and games versus a lack of rules
• what is "odd" or "weird" behavior and what are the ways we can respond to it?
• what makes something "scary"? where is the line between being scared for fun and being scared for real?
• how do filmmakers make something scary? how can I tell I'm watching a scary / horror movie?

I've got more Coraline materials to come, but just wanted to share what feels ready for others to use at this time.

❤️‍🔥 Cara