Trust director Wes Anderson to manage a children's film that has his trademark wry sense of humor and appeals to all ages equally. Pixar is usually one of the few companies that can make a movie that adults and children love equally, but with Fantastic Mr. Fox Anderson gave them some real competition. Made with stop-motion animation and based on a famous novel by the wonderful Roald Dahl, it put together brilliant voice acting, unique art direction, and a charming set of amusing characters. Now this Oscar-nominated movie is out on DVD and Blu-ray, and it should not be missed by anyone with a quirky sense of humor.
The story is about Mr. Fox (George Clooney), who used to steal chickens and livestock for a living but agreed to give it up when his wife Felicity (Meryl Streep) got pregnant. He's now a column writer but he is unhappy with his life and craves adventure and excitement again. With the help of his new home's superintendent Kylie (Wallace Wolodarsky), Fox plots to have one big heist. He wants to steal from all three of the local farmers and clean them out in a way he'll never be forgotten. He does succeed but this causes the farmers to go after him with a vengeance, and his family and friends pay the price for his arrogance.
Other characters include his troubled son Ash (Jason Schwartzman) and Felicity's nephew Kristofferson (Eric Chase Anderson), who is talented at everything he tries and Ash actively tries to compete with him. Badger (Bill Murray) is Fox's friend and lawyer who represents the rest of the animals in the area, and the wacky villainous Rat (Willem Dafoe) is on the side of the farmers and has a long standing rivalry with Fox. The movie has an eclectic and colorful cast of characters that are all amusing in their own way. Ash in particular illicits full out belly laughs as the dry tongued misfit who hates on his popular cousin.
The plot may be simple, but the film itself is anything but. The animation is fantastic and extremely well detailed. In a genre that could have encouraged a lot of dead eyes and almost creepy corpse-like figures, it instead is lively and emotional. This is an animated movie which is different from anything you've seen before due to the style and the director's vision. A lot of the humor is a little too droll for children to catch onto, but there are great images like the characters dancing and randomly going feral on one another that might delight kids. Overall, though, this is one of those movies that appear to be for a young audience, but adults will appreciate it the most.
Special Features:
The extras on both DVD and Blu-ray seem to be identical and include an explanation of how stop-motion animation is made and how it applied to this film, a discussion of how it was taken from the original novel and adapted, and a cute video about how the Whack-Bat game Ash loves is actually played. These extras were great and really gave me a better appreciation of how much work it took to make the film. With such a star studded cast it would've been nice to have some interviews with them about making the film, but what we get is worthwhile.
If you're a fan of Wes Anderson, dry cerebral comedy, Roald Dahl, and/or animation, this is the movie for you. Most of the jokes will go over the head of anyone under 10, but the younger audience might still enjoy it for the visuals and occasional silliness. It is an acquired taste, but this is one case when you should trust the critics and the Academy Awards: it's definitely worth seeing. Fantastic Mr. Fox is out on DVD and Blu-ray now.
ComicsOnline.com gives Fantastic Mr. Fox 4 out of 5 trademark whistles.
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