I have decided that I may start doing video reviews because I just don't really have the time to sit and write anymore with my jobs and auditions and whatnot. However, 2010 so far is an absolute marvel! I'm growing more into my own that I ever have and it took me letting go of some things to get to this place.
I am a HUGE Wes Anderson fan and the minute I heard he was doing a stop motion animated film, I was fucking stoked! If you've ever seen a Wes Anderson film, you'll know that he has played around with stop motion with little segments in his films and the fact that he was doing a full length feature was right down my alley. I swear I screamed like a fucking school girl when I read the news on IMDB like in 2008 I believe. The film has some great voice talents George Clooney (my man crush), Meryl Streep, Jason Schwartzman, Bill Murray, Michael Gambon, Owen Wilson, and Willem Dafoe to name a few. Even Wes Anderson himself lends his voice to a supporting character. There's also a very small voice cameo from Adrien Brody as a field mouse that if you blink you might miss it. The film is about a fox who wants a better life for him and his family and they move to a tree that is right near the three meanest men in their area. Risking it all for his family, Mr. Fox steals from the three men and ends up putting his family and his whole community in danger as the men set out to destroy Mr. Fox for stealing their chickens and cider.
What I found very interesting and lovable about this film is that it had that tailor made Wes Anderson flair about it that I love about all of his films. It was great to see him bring that to a stop animated film. Stop animation always fascinates me because after seeing the making of "Coraline", another stop animated film I love, I realized how much it time it took to execute a single movement. It's so amazing how it's done. I can't get over it. The voices fit the characters so well that it was almost as if I were watching the actors themselves. In most animated or stop animated films, as a voice actor you have to be elevated and really animated with your voice to bring the character to life for the kids. This film didn't do that as much and still managed to get across well. The dialogue was almost like it was from a Woody Allen film and for a film catered to kids or families that might be a problem but not here. It fit the tone and the characters of the story very well.
The music that accompanied this film was very well placed in each scene. This is another thing that Wes Anderson does quite well. They even used the song "Love" by Nancy Adams from another famous fox tale "Robin Hood" Disney's version of the beloved tale featuring foxes. That was a big selling point for me when I heard the soundtrack. So perfect. He also used other classic songs as well like "Fooba Wooba John" and "Davy Crockett". The one song that I LOVED that was in the film was a jazz instrumental version of "Night & Day". That's the kind of song that reminds me of New York. Sitting with your friends, talking and drinking wine. It's just one of those songs that you can just have on in the background and chill to and in this film they had one of the characters playing the piano. That was done very well because he was pushing all the right keys on the piano making it authentic as they could instead of just having him "appear" to be playing the piano.
This film is a technical achievement in every sense of the word and it will be on my best of 2009 list, coming soon I promise, I enjoyed this film and so will many people. I highly recommend it and what's even better is that this one is for the whole family. The even say the word "cuss" every time they are supposed to be saying a curse word, it's great! Check out the trailer!
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