If you and your friends are looking for a fun and easy activity around Seattle for spooky season, check out the Museum of Pop Culture downtown – its newest exhibit, “Hidden Worlds: The Films of LAIKA” might not scare your socks off, but you’ll come away overwhelmed by the sheer mastery behind the movies you love. (This article is for members of the Coraline fan club, by the way. No need to hang around if you don’t keep Neil Gaiman’s magnum opus in a little side pocket of your heart.)
LAIKA is a Portland-based film studio dedicated to the craft of stop-motion cinematography. Due to the outrageous attention to detail a full-length stop-motion feature requires, LAIKA has only five movies under its belt: Coraline (2009), Paranorman (2012), The Boxtrolls (2014), Kubo and the Two Strings (2016), and Missing Link (2019). A sixth project is presently underway, adapting Colin Meloy’s novel Wildwood for the silver screen.
These works all share a common soul, garnering affection from kids and adults alike with their elaborate sets and eccentric protagonists. And unlike other animated movies, LAIKA’s five fictional realms exist in real life – every precious peculiarity you see in Coraline, for instance, was shaped and set and filmed by human hands. Strolling through the MoPOP’s new exhibit, one finds herself surrounded by mini memorabilia. Coraline’s stuffed animals, tiny and intricate, pinned to a backboard. The Other Mother’s kitchen set, including all the food she served Coraline whilst luring her toward buttonhood. Most reverently, the Pink Palace itself; triple-tiered and lit up from the inside, the house seems to hold its breath, suspended in cinema right before your eyes. It was delightfully shocking to witness these artifacts in person. I got the sense I had paused the movie and crawled into the screen, the way Coraline crawled through her secret door. Frozen in time, I followed her footsteps.
I haven’t seen LAIKA’s other movies, but I still found myself grinning uncontrollably as I made my way through each segment of the exhibit. I’m inspired to add all four to my watchlist, having seen the amount of skill, effort, and care it took to bring those worlds out of hiding. I felt the joy of girlhood; that glowing instinct to make something little and delicate and vivid with your hands and then will yourself to shrink down and live inside it.
Whether you’re a Coraline devotee or an NPC, I urge you to make your way downtown and check out the MoPOP’s new LAIKA exhibit. You can’t miss it – the monorail takes you straight to the museum, and the exhibit itself is marked by a colossal red skeleton in chainmail glaring down at you with flaming eyes (apparently a staple of the movie Kubo and the Two Strings). Student discounts are offered, and tickets are cheaper when you reserve spots in advance. Even the public library encourages it, with a lottery system dealing out free tickets to cardholders. Support local arts and culture! No excuses!
Hidden Worlds: The Films of LAIKA runs through summer 2024. Have fun :)