Year: 2009
Director: Wes Anderson
Writers: Roald Dahl, Wes Anderson, Noah Baumbach
Mr. Fox returns to his old habits by stealing food from three farmers. After the farmers retaliate, he needs to help his community with his plan.
I've meant to see this movie for a while, but only now really made it. I had two reasons to watch this movie. First, I love Wes Anderson, and his movies always cheer me up. Like even if the movies would be kind of tragic (The Grand Budapest Hotel is partly very very sad), they are still always so... happy and aesthetically pleasing. Second reason is that I used to read this book a lot when I was little. Though it's been a very, very long time since I read that book, so I don't remember very well what in this movie was made up by Anderson and Baumbach, and what really was in the book.
First of all, the casting was interesting. Anderson's movies are always filled with really amazing actors and actresses, even in surprisingly small roles. That's what got me interested in The Grand Budapest Hotel in the first place, that and the cinematography. Anyway, I watched this movie for like five or ten minutes before I gave up and went to see who was playing who, and I was surprised to see that George Clooney was Mr. Fox, and Meryl Streep Mrs. Fox. Jason Schwartzman's voice I recognised immediately. Some of the actors weren't even that surprising, like Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, Adrien Brody and Schwartzman. Most of these have been in every Wes Anderson movie I've seen.
Of course at this point I could say that I'm kind of annoyed how often Hollywood actors doing voices get paid more than actual voice actors. And they don't usually even have the talent voice actors do. I think Billy West talked about this once. And I totally support this, because Billy West is one of the most amazing voice actors there is. I mean come on, he voiced so many characters on Futurama alone, and I didn't even realise it, because he can truly change his voice. These regular actors don't do that. But then again, I don't know, Wes Anderson is probably the kind of director who wants to use "real" actors, even if he's doing animation. And I don't know, it suits him, but it still bothers me.
I said before that Wes Anderson movies always cheer me up. Well this is true with Fantastic Mr. Fox also. It was a really cheerful movie, even though it had its really hopeless moments where it felt like the animals couldn't survive the events, but still, one of the happiest movies I've seen in a while, and it was fun in an animation kind of way.
And the animation, oh, it was so amazing. Beautiful, and so detailed. I haven't read about it properly anywhere, but I'm certain the animation was made with stop motion technique, same used in The Nightmare Before Christmas, Corpse Bride, etcetera. That technique takes a lot of effort and time, but the result is always worth it, because it is very pleasing to the eye, because it's so detailed. And stop motion technique really suits with Wes Anderson symmetric style.
I warmly recommend this movie to anyone who likes cheerful movies and isn't afraid of watching animations. And of course to everyone who loves Wes Anderson and hasn't yet seen Fantastic Mr. Fox. It might not be his best work, I mean compared to The Grand Budapest Hotel or Moonrise Kingdom, but it's worth watching.
☆☆☆☆☆☆
6 / 10
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