Film Reviews

Fantastic Mr. Fox

• Rating:
• Director: Wes Anderson
• Starring: George Clooney
• Details: US / 87mins (PG).

Cut to the chase: Fantastic Mr. Fox is typical Wes Anderson - visually interesting, quirky characters, odd sense of humour - but his bad habits stop it from being the film it should be.
"How can a fox be happy without a chicken in its mouth?" When he's caught stealing chickens, the wily Mr. Fox (Clooney) promises Mrs. Fox (Streep) that he will give up the life and settle down. Years later, with cub Ash (Schwartzman) in tow, Fox is a column writer for the local gazette but the temptation to return to his old ways proves too strong. Under the cover of night, Fox puts his 'one last job', a three-pronged plan, into action: rob farmers Boggis (Brian Cox), Bean (Michael Gambon) and Bunce (Hugo Guinness) of their chickens and cider. The farmers aren't going to take this lying down and employ every means at their disposal to root out all the wild animals in the area, a tactic that sees Fox at odds with his family and friends.
Despite being an adapted from a Roald Dahl book and using the stop motion animation that fans of The Wind in the Willows will be familiar with, the audience is never in doubt that Fantastic Mr. Fox is a Wes Anderson film. The director's style is evident from the opening credit sequence - a typically ordered intro coupled with the usual plink-plonk piano soundtrack. With all the slick CGI animations around at the moment, the visuals take a bit of getting used to at first, but as time goes on the brilliance shines through. Anderson uses the chance to play around, particularly with light and colour, and some scenes are just a joy to watch.
Anderson's whimsical and absurd characters are present and correct, too. Clooney's Mr. Fox has a lot in common with Family Guy's Brian. Fox is more human than animal - he's smart, wears sharp clothes, stands upright, has a job and the responsibilities of a father - but sometimes he is just a fox. Clooney has fun in the role and we can almost hear him winking every time he speaks. Anderson' trademark characterisation (be true to yourself and the good will out) sees Mr. Fox continue on from Rushmore's Max, Tenenbaums' Royal, Life Aquatic's Steve Zissou and Darjeeling Limited's Francis. Streep has less to work with than Clooney, restricted by a fuddy-duddy role, while Schwartzman's woe-is-me teenager grates after a time, although there's humour to be found when he goes head-to-head with his cousin Kristofferson (a Jesse Eisenberg-sounding Eric Anderson, Wes' brother). Murray's badger, Mr. Fox's lawyer, is an extended cameo. Anjelica Huston, Owen Wilson, Willem Dafoe, Adrien Brody and Jarvis Cocker pitch in with minor roles.
It's all bit of fun, but Anderson can't shake his bad habits. He is a writer who sticks rigidly to the three-act structure, splitting his films into chapters, with the final act divided into two parts. Because of the stop-start nature his films, they can be accused of lacking flow, with the plot leaping from one set piece to another, and this is no different. And, like his previous efforts, Mr. Fox takes an age to wind up his plot, even one as short as 87 minutes.

Review by Gavin Burke