Coraline All Grown Up

This weekend I treated myself to a cinematic adventure: MirrorMask (Neil Gaiman & Dave McKean). The madcap art at the center of this film immediately brought to mind the fonts and drawings of Neil Gaiman's book, Coraline.

The film and the book have more than just typeface in common. Both Coraline and the heroine of MirrorMask, Helena, make that cruel and common childish wish that they could somehow get rid their family. In Helena's case, she wishes that her mother were dead, and within minutes Mum is on a gurney headed to the hospital where she'll be diagnosed with a grave illness that could well result in her death.

Like Coraline, Helena discovers a fantasy world parallel to her own. Helena's "Oz" is a world of her own creation, a place made up entirely of her own drawings. Like Coraline, Helena finds a flipside version of her mother and father in this fantastic realm.

And here, all similarities to Coraline, The Wizard of Oz, and Alice in Wonderland end. With the advent of Helena, Gaiman and McKean are ready to help Coraline-Dorothy-Alice grow up.

You see, in the land of Oz, down the rabbit hole, and through the mysterious door in Coraline's flat, there is only ever one Dorothy, one Alice, one Coraline. In MirorMask there are two Helenas.

In Coraline's fantasy world, Coraline is the protagonist, and the evil alternate reality version of her mother is the antagonist. In Helena's alternate reality there are two versions of her mother: one good, and one evil. The mothers are neither antagonist nor protagonist. The protagonist in MirrorMask is Real Helena, and the antagonist is Evil Helena.

Evil Helena is from the imaginary world of Real Helena's drawings. Evil Helena runs away from her mother, the evil queen. In order to escape, she must steal a charm, the MirrorMask, from the good queen, causing the good queen to fall into a deep and death-like sleep. When Evil Helena escapes "Oz" she takes over Real Helena's place in the real world. Evil Helena wants to destroy the fantasy world (by burning all her drawings) so that she can never be forced to go back. She also wants to snog boys, smoke, and be rude to her elderly aunt.

In short, Evil Helena wants to grow up.

In order to save the good queen, Real Helena must overcome her own childishness. She must send her evil self back to the childish world of fantasy and, as a consequence, she emerges in the real world no longer a child, but an adult.

There was only one Dorothy, one Alice, one Coraline. With the advent of the second Helena, we take a tale meant to help children find their place in the big world, and turn it into a tale meant to show teenagers how to leave the world of childhood and become adults.