In the small fictional town of Blithe Hollow, Massachusetts, Norman Babcock is an 11-year-old boy who speaks with the dead, including his late grandmother and various ghosts in town. The film was nominated for that year's Academy Award for Best Animated Feature and BAFTA Award for Best Animated Film, but both lost to Pixar's Brave. It received generally positive reviews from critics, who praised its animation and humor, and was a modest box office success, earning $107 million worldwide against its budget of $60 million. ParaNorman was officially released on August 17, 2012, by Focus Features. In the film, Norman, a young boy who can communicate with ghosts, is given the task of ending a 300-year-old witch's curse on his Massachusetts town.
It is the first stop-motion film to use a 3D color printer to create character faces, and only the second to be shot in 3D. Produced by Laika, the film stars the voices of Kodi Smit-McPhee, Jodelle Ferland, Bernard Hill, Tucker Albrizzi, Anna Kendrick, Casey Affleck, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Leslie Mann, Jeff Garlin, Elaine Stritch, Tempestt Bledsoe, Alex Borstein, and John Goodman.
ParaNorman is a 2012 American stop-motion animated dark fantasy comedy horror film directed by Sam Fell and Chris Butler, and written by Butler.
