Frankenweenie (Animated)

By Justin Chang 上 九月 21, 2012

A black-and-white stop-motion toon that pays loving tribute to Hollywood creature features of yesteryear, this beautifully designed canine-resurrection saga feels, somewhat fittingly, stitched together from stray narrative parts.

The traditional tale of a boy and his dog gets charmingly warped treatment in "Frankenweenie," Tim Burton's latest spooky-fun exercise in animation and reanimation. A black-and-white stop-motion toon that pays loving tribute to Hollywood creature features of yesteryear, this beautifully designed canine-resurrection saga feels, somewhat fittingly, stitched together from stray narrative parts, but nonetheless evinces a level of discipline and artistic coherence missing from the director's recent live-action efforts. Fusing gentle, sentimental emotions and a classically Burtonian obsession with all things morbid and macabre, Disney's Oct. 5 release should fetch lively returns from devotees and general audiences of all ages.

Though decisively superior to "Dark Shadows," the year's other Burton-directed release, "Frankenweenie" merits stronger comparisons with Focus/Laika's recent "ParaNorman," another stop-motion spookfest centered around a young boy's adventures with the undead. The protagonist here is Victor Frankenstein (voiced by Charlie Tahan), who lives with his doting parents (Catherine O'Hara, Martin Short) and his faithful bull terrier, Sparky, in the Dutch-influenced 1970s town of New Holland. Yet Victor might be described more correctly as a resident of Burtonville, a now-universally recognized township where a spirit of deadpan whimsy prevails and even minor characters have been shaped to resemble Igor or Frankenstein's monster. Read the entire review on Variety's website.