This Halloween season, we will have the chance to go back to Blithe Hollow, Massachusetts and re-visit 11-year-old Norman Babcock. That’s right, LAIKA’s stop-motion masterpiece ParaNorman will be back in theaters for a one-week engagement this October.
LAIKA previously did something similar with its 2024 re-release of Coraline, bringing it to theaters in 2D and RealD 3D, and that was a huge success. Coraline brought in $56 million world-wide during its re-release, making it the top-grossing stop-motion film of all time.
ParaNorman won several awards upon its initial release, and it will be presented in remastered 2D and RealD 3D formats. The re-release kicks off the 20th anniversary celebration of LAIKA.
ParaNorman’s re-release will feature a new animated short by LAIKA, titled ParaNorman: The Thrifting, which is directed by Thibault LeClercq (the lead character designer for LAIKA). Finn Wolfhard (Stranger Things) and Anna Kendrick (Woman of the Hour) lent their voices to the short film. Kendrick voiced the role of Norman’s sister Courtney in the original film.
Other actors who lent their voices to the film include Kodi Smit-McPhee, Tucker Albrizzi, John Goodman, Elaine Stritch, Casey Affleck and Christopher Mintz-Plasse.
ParaNorman will release via Fathom Entertainment on Saturday, October 25.
LAIKA’s Chief Marketing & Operations Officer David Burke pronounced ParaNorman as “a breakthrough film for LAIKA – emotionally rich, visually daring, and proudly weird in all the right ways.” He said that horror movie viewing has become a family ritual in many cases, and thinks ParaNorman is the perfect film for kids who are interested in horror.
Fathom Entertainment’s CEO Ray Nutt was excited about the financial success of Coraline’s re-release last year, and said, “ParaNorman is the ideal, spooky follow-up for audiences to enjoy on the big screen later this year.”
Released in 2012, ParaNorman was the first stop-motion film that used a 3-D printer to create its character’s faces. In the film, 11-year-old Norman has the ability to talk to the dead, and regularly converses with his late grandmother and other ghosts in Blithe Hollow.
The other kids just think he is weird, but he becomes friends with another outcast, Neil Downe. Shortly before his death, Norman’s great-uncle, Mr. Prenderghast, warns him that he will soon have to take up the ritual his uncle has been performing for years, which he claims protects the town.
The events that follow take Norman, Neil and their siblings on a paranormal adventure that includes encounters with witches, zombies and ghosts.