Between the disappointing news of David Cronenberg’s planned Eastern Promises sequel and now this, it’s not a good day for cult filmmakers and their ambitions. Because Disney has decided to shut down Coraline director Henry Selick’s latest, as-yet-untitled stop-motion film.

You might think being the man who made The Nightmare Before Christmas would carry enough cachet to keep any project on the right track, but apparently the film, which had been scheduled for release Stateside on October 4 next year, hadn’t reached a satisfactory creative or scheduling point to meet that date, and the Mouse House’s new boss Alan Horn had made the decision to pull the plug.

Selick, who had been working on the movie with around 150 staff members at his Shademaker Productions facility in San Francisco, now has the option to offer the project elsewhere. Strangely, he may be helped by the fact that big decisions such as casting and artwork had yet to be made, which could make it more attractive to other potential distributors.

This does not affect his progress on Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book – that’s still chugging away, though it has yet to lock in a writer or other talent. Thank goodness for that!