12.7.2009 | 5:08 pm

Deeper Into Movies: “Fantastic Mr. Fox”

I was left ambivalent by Wes Anderson’s last effort, The Darjeeling Limited — a movie alternately palpably emotional and adrift in its own myopic quirk (and reviewed by me here). Fantastic Mr. Fox is a return to form, and really, a new form for the director: stop-motion animation, which under his precise eye is a joy to watch. (Between this and Coraline, can everybody but Pixar really just hang up the CGI, please?) George Clooney and Meryl Streep lead Anderson’s usual gang (Jason Schwartzman, Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, etc.) as the voices of a band of eccentric animals playing out the rakish adventures of Roald Dahl’s book of the same name.

The director has always been interested in the darker motives of human nature, and with Fox, he seems to poke fun at himself — “I’m a wild animal,” the titular hero tells us, even as his cohorts chat on mobile phones and brandish credit cars. The dichotomy’s clever scripting makes for a number of laughs, but it’s the film’s acrobatics and elegant visuals — shot always at precise, f-stopped right angles — that turn Fantastic Mr. Fox into Anderson’s most exuberant work. Welcome back, Wes. Now, can we boldly go?

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  • leo shaw

    I don’t know dude. The movie really rubbed me the wrong way on a lot of levels. The cutesy outfits and helvetica-loaded gadgets, the random southern accents breaking continuity, the straight-outta life aquatic egotistical father/unloved son adventure plot, and the overindulgent fluffiness of the whole thing. I didn’t feel like it really addressed those darker motives in any kind of thoughtful way before it got distracted with gimmicky action sequences and quirky animation. Plus (and i’m not just pissed that it’s different from the original) the fact that it completely disregarded a treasure trove of awesome dialogue, action, and plot in the book. Not to mention the awesome, dry, Britishness of it.

  • David Greenwald

    Haven’t read the book. Was really glad he chose not to go into the darker stuff directly and used it as knowing comedic fodder instead.

  • Jess

    I’m never fond of Wes Anderson films. Hated those aesthetics, quirks, etc. but I have to say thank god he did not sacrifice those idiosyncrasies when adapting a children’s classic. I am glad those things showed up and I will be terribly disappointed if he have to tone down his stylings even for a wee bit. A true artist should not give in to what people are saying.