AT THIS POINT, the lazy way to complain about Wes Anderson is
to say one of the following phrases:
(1) “All of his movies are the same.”
(2) “None of his movies after Rushmore and The Royal
Tenenbaums have been any good.”
(3) “He’s just so goddamn adorable and precious and
twee.”
You will inevitably hear these phrases when Wes Anderson’s name
comes up. You are free to buy into them, even though (1) isn’t true,
(2) doesn’t hold water, and (3), well, of course he is, and chances
are, if you’re debating the films of Wes Anderson, so are you.
Fantastic Mr. Fox—despite the fact it’s filmed via
stop-motion animation—feels very much like Wes Anderson’s other
movies, which means if you’re the sort of person who likes to scoff at
Anderson, you will find plenty of justification to do so after seeing
Fox. But to complain that the film is just more of the same
overlooks the pretty crucial fact that, well, that “same” is pretty
extraordinary: The reason Anderson’s style is so immediately
recognizable and so open to criticism is because it’s so original, so
earnest, and so finely tuned.
Fantastic Mr. Fox isn’t Anderson’s best film, but it might be
his most fully realized. Via stop-motion animation, the meticulous
Anderson revels in a level of control that’s any OCD sufferer’s
dream. Anderson’s films have always displayed his
near-psychopathic obsession with the tiniest of details, from the
patterns of background wallpaper to the exacting typefaces in his
credit sequences; with Fox, he’s created an entire miniature
world, and it’s hardly surprising that his cast of witty woodland
creatures wear only the finest corduroy and tweed.
What is a bit of a surprise is that Anderson—with help from an
impressive vocal cast that includes George Clooney, Meryl Streep, Jason
Schwartzman, and Bill Murray—keeps much of the heart that marks
his live-action work. Fox‘s story hews closely to Roald Dahl’s
book, or at least what I remember of it from my second-grade book
report. Mr. Fox (Clooney) is a part-time family man and a part-time
chicken thief; as he gleefully concocts elaborate schemes to rip off
the storehouses of nearby farmers, Fox feels a bit like a
super-cute reenactment of Ocean’s Eleven. (Or, at least, it does
until three ugly, mean farmers get fed up and decide to kill Fox, his
family, and his friends.)
Meanwhile, the most affecting—and funniest—moments of
the film come from Fox’s insecure son, Ash (Schwartzman), who
simultaneously tries to impress his dad and tear down his annoyingly
perfect cousin, Kristofferson (Eric Anderson). Also, the Stones’
“Street Fighting Man” and the Beach Boys’ “Heroes and Villains” are
charmingly used, the gorgeous animation thankfully lacks any apparent
CG enhancement, and, for its entire runtime, the whole thing barrels
along delightfully—it’s hilarious and charming and sweet and
melancholy and Wes Anderson-y, which at this point, probably either is
your thing or it isn’t.
