Posted on Mon, Nov. 30, 2009 10:27 AM
‘Fantastic Mr. Fox’ gets a bit fuzzy | 2 ½ stars
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When it works, “Fantastic Mr. Fox” is a slyly goofy pleasure.
When it doesn’t — often the case in its second half — you’re left wondering what’s going on.
We shouldn’t be surprised. Though animated, “Mr. Fox” was directed by Wes Anderson, who in films such as “Rushmore,” “The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou” and “Bottle Rocket” has exhibited a quirky, hard-to-pin-down sensibility that strikes some viewers as pure genius and leaves others cold.
Based on a book by Roald Dahl, the film employs stop-action animation to tell the tale of Mr. Fox (voiced by George Clooney). He’s a cocky creature who has so often raided nearby property in search of sustenance that three farmers — Boggis, Bunce and Bean — band together to hunt him down.
The story isn’t all that unusual. The way it’s presented is.
Mr. Fox behaves and dresses like one of those ’60s ad execs in “Mad Men.” He walks upright, wears a suit and tie, is always thinking about upward mobility (one scene finds him talking home mortgages with a badger attorney — Bill Murray) and, like a good con artist, is proud of his ability to run circles around his human marks. When feeling particularly self-congratulatory he issues his trademark series of whistles and tongue clicks.
His resemblance to a human suburban dad doesn’t end there. Fox, the Missus (Meryl Streep), their slacker son (Jason Schwartzman) and visiting nephew (Eric Anderson, the director’s brother) all live beneath a big tree in a subterranean lair that looks like a ’60s tract home: appliances, wood paneling, electric lights.
The first half-hour of “Fantastic Mr. Fox” is filled with the joy of discovering an animated world unlike anything we’ve ever seen. Seeing furry creatures behaving like our neighbors offers a pleasant sort of dislocation.
But once the novelty wears off, the film settles into a not-terribly-interesting interspecies war pitting the animals against the environment-ravaging farmers.
Part of the problem is that stop-motion animation (employing puppets filmed one frame at a time) and the characters’ design are hard to swallow at feature length. I’ve had this problem with other stop-motion films such as “Coraline” and even “The Nightmare Before Christmas” and with Japanese anime as well — at some point the lack of subtle human facial expression creates a barrier that’s hard to overcome.
Anderson attempts to get around this with a stylized visual sense. Many scenes are played out as if on a theatrical stage or within a diorama. The characters move around full-figure within the frame, allowing our eyes to settle where they will.
Ultimately you have to ask who the target audience is. “Mr. Fox” is too sophisticated for small children, and yet it failed to fully engage this adult.
The answer is that it’s a Wes Anderson movie and will probably be best appreciated by fans of … Wes Anderson.
Director: Wes Anderson
Cast: Voices of George Clooney, Meryl Streep, Bill Murray, Jason Schwartzman
Rated: PG for action, smoking and slang humor
Running time: 1:27
Posted on Mon, Nov. 30, 2009 10:27 AM
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