On Monday morning, the simply awesome CORALINE is released on 3D Blu-Ray in the UK. We have a bunch of interiews with two of the vocal actors in the movie, Teri Hatcher and Dakota Fanning and the flick’s director Henry Selick.

Coraline Jones (Fanning; New Moon, The Secret Life of Bees, War of the Worlds) is a girl aged 11 who is feisty, curious, and adventurous beyond her years. She and her parents (Teri Hatcher, John Hodgman) have just relocated from Michigan to Oregon. Missing her friends and finding her parents to be distracted by their work, Coraline tries to find some excitement in her new environment. She is befriended – or, as she sees it, is annoyed – by a local boy close to her age, Wybie Lovat (Robert Bailey Jr.); and visits her older neighbours, eccentric British actresses Miss Spink and Forcible (Jennifer Saunders and Dawn French) as well as the arguably even more eccentric Russian Mr. Bobinsky (Ian McShane).

After these encounters, Coraline seriously doubts that her new home can provide anything truly intriguing to her but it does; she uncovers a secret door in the house. Walking through the door and then venturing through an eerie passageway, she discovers an alternate version of her life and existence. On the surface, this parallel reality is similar to her real life – only much better. The adults, including the solicitous Other Mother (also voiced by Teri Hatcher), seem much more welcoming to her. Coraline is more the center of attention there – even from the mysterious Cat (Keith David). She begins to think that this Other World might be where she belongs. But when her wondrously off-kilter, fantastical visit turns dangerous and Other Mother schemes to keep her there, Coraline musters all of her resourcefulness, determination, and bravery to get back home – and save her family.

A visually stunning and frightfully magical treat for all the family, the 3D Blu-ray is compatible with the latest 3D TVs and comes complete with 2D Blu-ray and DVD versions of the film. Packed with special features including deleted scenes, an audio commentary, and three fantastical featurettes, don’t miss out on the chance to experience Coraline in stereoscopic 3D high definition this Easter!

Check out the interviews below.

TERI HATCHER

This is your first voice work?
TERI: This is where I get to check off the box of being an animated voice in a kid’s film. It was amazing. I feel so fortunate. I’m a huge fan of Henry Selick and that kind of animation. I feel this story is deep and entertaining, and the kind of story that just stays with you. It was a great challenge to get to play not just one but three different characters.

Why do you think you were cast?
TERI: I don’t know Henry’s journey of casting. I understand he listened to many voices but he felt that mine and Dakota’s voice fell into a particular cadence that he felt was accurate and correct. We spoke on the phone and he cast me. It’s the kind of thing you don’t know what you are going to get. He didn’t know I could sing and hum the things in between. I didn’t know the guttural raw place my voice could go or the higher place. It was a discovery for both of us.

What did you like about the film?
TERI: Sometimes I think 3D can be jarring. I think this film made the best use of it. Instead of these things coming at you, it was like you were invited into this world. It was this seamless experience and I love the fact that it grew at a particular pace. Why would this kid want to go off to this other place, so you really had to be mired in this boredom and neglect, and then you see the film pick up and pick up. I love being a piece of this big beautiful pie. There was no Teri Hatcher star or Dakota Fanning star. To me it was an amazing experience.

Your daughter voiced a character in the movie?
TERI: She plays a firefly when they come by and say “Coraline, Coraline”. It was really sweet. I started working on the film when she was eight and all I had was sketches, but she was really into the story and the scariness of it. So right from the beginning she was excited to be involved. Not that she wants to be an actress or anything, but when we were up in Portland seeing the animation studios, I was doing some recording there and Henry let her go into the recording studio and gave her some direction and he ended up leaving it in the movie.

Does she relate to any of the mothers?
TERI: I don’t think she relates to any of the mothers I play. She doesn’t watch Desperate Housewives. I think that’s my biggest accomplishment. I can keep it very separate. For this role I don’t think there is any Teri or even Susan in them. I channeled some other mothers I know who get to that really exhausted overworked feeling. Most of them have more than one child. I have seen that expression of getting to that place but it’s not really a place I get to with my daughter; although I think it’s a relatable place for a parent to be.

Didn’t you find some of the lines hard to say? You found it hard to say “shut up”?
TERI: Yeah I did. I think that was the hardest voice for me to honestly find. Where is the place you have to get to as a mother to tell my kid to shut up? I have never told my daughter that, not even close. I don’t think we have even ever had an argument. I don’t judge the other side of it. It’s just what we have, and it doesn’t mean that when she hits 14 she won’t hate my guts. But it’s what we have and how we communicate, so I’ve never told my kid to shut up and I had to try and find the honest place to do that.

What is your secret?
TERI: Honestly, my secret. I do write a bit about this in my book, but I honestly believe that the secret is before you get to that point. The secret is allowing yourself to communicate with your kids so you talk to them before they push you to a point. If you think you are going to have a stressful day, you start the morning with saying,” I just want to let you know this is going to be a five cup of coffee day for me.” You try to use humour. You try to embrace the imperfections in yourself and be honest rather than trying to suppress yourself and be perfect mum or perfect dad. I think it’s better to say those things so there is an expectation that is more realistic and I think if you do that on a consistent basis you may end up with a different result.

But you need time to do that?
TERI: Well I didn’t work for the first five years after she was born. I did Cabaret on the road for seven months, but that was performing at night and I did Spy Kids which was only three weeks work. So I was around. I didn’t sleep. She was the worst sleeper. I was tired like everyone else but I wasn’t making myself do other things. I think that is the problem, we over tax ourselves. I have so many friends who I tell, “Put the blackberry in the glove department”. We have to slow down. We are doing too many things at the same time, and that’s what makes us blow up.

But how do you balance that now that you are busier?
TERI: It’s good she is older now. I think the older they get, the busier you allow yourself to be. She has her own thing now and she wants to be with her friends. So you get more space as they get older, you just need to survive those first five or six years.

Is she aware her mother is famous?
TERI: I think in our family I’m her mother. If you are going to define me I’m Emerson’s mum and Teri Hatcher is just a costume I put on for people sometime. When we are together I sometimes don’t take pictures with people who ask, because I think it takes attention away from her, but I think she is old enough now, if it’s a little kid that comes up she will give me that look of, “Yeah it’s OK”. But she knows it’s an image and people are just as apt to mean as nice. You have a close family of friends and family and who loves and know you. All the rest of it is noise. It’s part of the business you have to play.

Do you think your daughter will follow in your footsteps?
TERI: I don’t know what she is going to do. She is quite a writer. She loves to write poetry and draw. When we went to Africa she was really touched by the kids with AIDS, so I can see her wanting to work in some global aspect. It’s nice to be a kid with a lot of choices and I think she is aware of that and is grateful.

DAKOTA FANNING (Coraline)

You were pretty young when you started with this. Was it like growing up with Coraline?
DAKOTA: It definitely was. I was very young when I started and I’ve been working on this for about four years, so I definitely have grown up with Coraline.

How did you change in that time?
DAKOTA: I didn’t. I don’t think you can really judge if you change. I look at myself from last year and don’t think I’ve changed at all yet everyone says I look really different. I’m like okay, well maybe I have.

But you’re transitioning now aren’t you? You’re no longer playing the scared daughter. You must be looking at different scripts now.
DAKOTA: I’m 15 so I’m looking forward to the different types of roles I can play that come with age, but I’m still grateful for the scared daughter roles as well.

Are you worried about being a teenager in Hollywood?
DAKOTA: Well, I’ve already managed two years so I’m good so far! You have to remain true to yourself and you can only do what’s right for you. You can’t worry about anyone else. You’re always going to make a mistake and some people are always going to find a mistake in something that you do. You just have to accept that and learn from it, and realise that you’re a person just like everyone else. You just have to do the best you can while you get to do something you love. I’ve just accepted that’s what comes with what I love to do, so it’s worth it.

Other than working, what do you like to do?
DAKOTA: I do have a horse, so I ride my horse when I can. I’m very happy just being at home with my family. I love being with my sister and my friends. It’s nice to miss that when you’re working, and then I miss working when I’m having my normal life. I like having the pull of both, because you know it’s really balanced.

What attracted you to the role?
DAKOTA: For Coraline when I was first approached to do it, it was going to be a live action movie and I was going to do that. Some time went by and they said we’re going to do this as an animated movie, would you still like to do the voice of Coraline? I thought, sure. I had done a few animated things, but none of them had come out in theatres. I thought it would be so much fun to do, especially when I first saw what Coraline would look like. She has blue hair, she has striped stockings. I think that looks so much fun! I also did see some of myself in Coraline and I thought that would be really cool to portray with just my voice.

What do you see in yourself that you see in Coraline?
DAKOTA:: I think we’re both very curious. I was trying to think if I saw a little door in my house would I go and open it and go through it and I think I would.

You think she’s more of a tomboy than you, right?
DAKOTA: Yeah I’m more girly.

Does that mean you like to wear a lot of dresses?
DAKOTA: When I was younger I would never wear pants. But I collect dolls still. I collect Madame Alexander dolls and I have a hundred of them. They’re beautiful.

So people know what to get for your birthday.
DAKOTA: Yeah, my mum gets me one every year.

A lot of people say Coraline is very dark. Do you agree?
DAKOTA: I do and I don’t. I definitely think it has a spooky, dark feeling to some parts of it. But it’s definitely fun. I don’t think kids will look at it as scary. I think they’ll look at it as more of an adventure. They’ll look at it as a cool ride almost. I know that when I first watched it I thought it was kind of spooky, but in a good way.

Do you get freaked out by buttons?
DAKOTA: (laughs) I know. Buttons have a new meaning now.

You’ve been in some scary movies though. What scares you?
DAKOTA: I can’t pinpoint anything, but I was watching a movie with Kate Beckinsale and Luke Wilson called Vacancy. That was scary. I was so scared by that, I screamed. My friend told me I was breathing so loud, I had to stop it, but I was so scared!

You went to the set. What was that like?
DAKOTA: It was unlike anything I had ever seen. The sets were huge and to see them moving the models and shooting them was incredible. Four seconds of film is considered a really great day and two seconds was an average day. That is unbelievable.

Did you get to keep a Coraline puppet?
DAKOTA: I got a model. Not one of the movable ones, but I got a model and also a little doll.

You didn’t get to work with Teri, but did you know her?
DAKOTA: I know her from various events I’ve gone to, but I didn’t get to work with her unfortunately. Desperate Housewives is my favourite show.

The director says he was surprised how mature you were for your age when he first met you.
DAKOTA: I’ve always been that way. When I go for meetings, I always go by myself and I have since I was six years old. Of course I have my parents and an agent I’m not like alone in this and I have so many people who help me, but I think when it comes to choosing the movies you want to do, I’m the one who has to put so much of my time and energy into it. It’s hard work to do a movie; you have to be so committed to that project so at the end of the day I think I have to be impacted by it. When you meet with a director though I think it’s great to have that one on one time with them and it’s great to see what it would be like working with them.

Do you make your own bed at home?
DAKOTA: My parents have never given me an allowance to do chores. My mum said ‘I’m not going to pay you to make your bed. You’ll make your bed when I tell you to.’ Whatever my parents ask me to do, I do.

Was it you who wanted to act?
DAKOTA: I got discovered when I did a play and then the head of the playhouse told my mum that she should get me an agent. Months went by before she went to an open call with an agent in Atlanta. I got two commercials in 10 days and they thought I should go to LA for pilot season. So I came here for pilot season and I kept staying. Then I got I Am Sam. It wasn’t until I got about four movies that my mum said ‘Well I guess we’re staying.’ I told her I really liked it here and said, yeah, I guess we’re staying mum.

How do you like LA?
DAKOTA: I love it so much. The weather is beautiful and I’ve lived here for nine years so I’ve lived here longer than I lived in Georgia. I would still say I’m from Georgia, but I’ve lived here much longer.

What are you going to do at the end of high school?
DAKOTA: I would like to go to college. It would be a great experience and it’s something I’ve always said I’d do. I went to a regular high school and I’d like to go to a regular college.

How do you friends treat you at school? Do they treat you differently?
DAKOTA: No. I know people think I might be lying when I say this, but it’s so normal. It’s like I’ve been there my whole life. I have great friends and great teachers and I’m very grateful they let me leave and do my work.

How do you not have an ego?
DAKOTA: Thank you. I go to a normal school and I’m just at home with my family. I don’t do anything differently than anybody else. When I come home from a movie, I just play with my dog. There’s nothing abnormal about my life.

Are you going to start your own clothing line, have your own perfume?
DAKOTA: No (laughs). Right now, being Dakota is the only brand. If you want to see me, go watch me in a movie.

Is there someone you haven’t worked with yet that you haven’t?
DAKOTA: I’d love to work with Jodie Foster. I’ve been saying it for years so I must sound like a broken record and she must be sick of hearing it. She is such a role model to me and I’m going to keep on saying it until one day, we work together.

What if tomorrow they said, we’re not going to hire Dakota Fanning anymore. Would you refocus?
DAKOTA: I’ve never thought about it. I don’t know what I’d do. I’ve spent so much of my life on this. This is what I want to do for the rest of my life. This is what I have chosen to do. I’m sure I could find something else to do, but I don’t plan on having to readjust.

HENRY SELICK (Director)

How did you choose the voices?
HENRY: I met Dakota when she was nine years old when we were still in the early period of development, when we were first considering the film as live action. She had read the book and read an early draft of the script and it was a one on one meeting. There was no one else there like her mum to advise her, and she showed this amazing understanding of the character and what she loved about Coraline and how she thought she might play it. I felt she really understood the character and had a great voice. So once we had Dakota then I wanted to match a voice that would be perfect as her mother. I probably listened to a 100 actresses as possible mothers, watching many movies on DVDs. For me there were only three that worked well. One of them was Teri Hatcher and when I met with her I knew she would be perfect.

How did you direct them?
HENRY: With Dakota I asked her to do a mid western accent. Voice acting can be really difficult. There are no sets or costumes so it can be very challenging. We did many recording sessions over a long period of time and the accent was a way for Dakota to get back into character very quickly. Teri had a very challenging job as she had four mothers to do. There was her real mum who is one note and cold. That’s the one Teri never wants to be with her real daughter, but she got in tune with that, then there is the other mother which is more like how Teri really is – warm, loving, giving, but then there is two more, when she first gets angry and she gets haughty and dangerous and throws Coraline in the closet and finally the last of the other mothers when she is a creature and is hungry. That was a lot of adjustments Teri had to make, but I think she handled them all brilliantly.

What attracted you to the story?
HENRY: I like classic fairy tales like what Disney made in his first movies. There was true darkness that I think children are in tune with, true scares but also with humour there. There was also that universal sense that everyone wants a different life. They want different parents, or different kids. Everyone knows that feeling of wanting something else. I think Neil Gaiman is brilliant – I mean buttons for eyes. There is no perfect explanation why he did it, but it’s a very creepy powerful thing. The very idea that the other mother thought Coraline would have buttons sewed into her eyes to stay with her is so unnerving.

How did you interpret the characters visually from the book?
HENRY: When I got the book, it wasn’t even published and there were no drawings so I had my own images and ideas. By the time the book came out with the artwork by Dave McKean, I had already formed my own ideas. I was a Disney animator and I can sketch. But I found some great animators, Japanese illustrator Tadahiro Uesugi. I loved his colour palette and I hired him to do the early sketches, which was a guide post for me. I was pushing for something not too cartoony, not live action, I wanted incredible detail that you could go in close and see there was hair, not a lump of clay and that she has freckles – I was pushing the believability of the film so we could go in for a close up and still have a sense this is real.

Why did you decide to introduce the new character of Wybie?
HENRY: My first draft of the script was too faithful to the book and it didn’t really work as a movie. The two big changes I made was that I set it in the US because I just wasn’t comfortable writing British English, what some would call real English. I also realised I needed another person for Coraline to interact with. We can read how she is feeling and her inner dialogue but for the film I needed someone for her to go up against. Wybie started as a device in some ways, and then two months before we finished I realised I needed to show his grandmother at the end. She can’t be an idea. I needed to have her calling for him. Neil was very happy with all the changes I made.

Who do you think the movie will appeal to?
HENRY: We always said it was for brave kids for 8 and up. We are hoping it’s a film people will come back to many times or years from now. People may see it when they are 12 now and when they are older and have kids themselves they will go back and see it. Stop motion gives it a timeless feel. I didn’t want to feel like the jokes were there today and then they will get tired. It’s very different but sometimes different gets attention and if you can deliver that can be good, but it’s definitely a risky film.

What will experience be like for people on DVD?
HENRY: There will be a Blu-ray and a normal DVD. We worked very hard to master a 2 D version which is extraordinary. It’s not the same, but you have better colour and contrast. We didn’t rely overly on the 3D. It’s not like the movie doesn’t work without it. It just enhances what’s there.

CORALINE, the 3D Blu-ray is released on the 11th April 2011.