It’s hard to believe Movie Night’s gone this long without me writing about a Wes Anderson film. For you see, I am in that infamous group of filmgoers that can’t get enough Wes Anderson. We are the Society of Crossed Keys, and we’ll find something to like about a Wes Anderson movie, even if we didn’t totally understand what we just watched. (The second, third, or fourth viewings usually clear things up.) Yes, we can come off as insufferable: you don’t want to be around me when someone mentions they didn’t like Asteroid City (2023). But for my part at least, my love for Anderson’s films stems from the appreciation that they exist at all. That in an age of maximally corporatized art production, there’s a rare bird out there who figures out repeatedly how to get his evolving visions brought to life. I wonder if this is what watching Kubrick in real-time was like? Who was the somewhat polarizing, generally accepted oddball director before Anderson?
One film of Wes Anderson that everyone agrees is great: Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009). There’s a charm in Anderson’s vision here that feels like a family heirloom handmade quilt: meticulously crafted, warm, fraying at the edges. It’s his first foray into stop-motion animation. Despite this, Anderson's DNA is unmistakable: symmetrical framing, autumnal color palette, wry humor, and characters who deliver their lines in a straight and direct fashion; something often called out as stiff in his movies, despite this being the most realistic thing about his movies. (Listen to conversations in your life, people!)
The film, adapted from Roald Dahl’s 1970 children’s book, centers on Mr. Fox (George Clooney), a reformed chicken thief turned newspaper columnist, who can’t quite shake the itch for one last big heist. He lives a seemingly contented life with his wife, Felicity (Meryl Streep), and their son, Ash (Jason Schwartzman), in a cozy underground home. He’s getting old. He knows he should be content, but just can’t shake… what is it he can’t shake? His nature? His plan to raid the farms of Boggis, Bunce, and Bean of their goods sets off a chain reaction of human-animal conflict, forcing the entire woodland community to adapt or perish.
Anderson’s stop-motion world is tactile in a way that modern CG doesn’t match. The fur on the characters ripples from the animators’ fingerprints; sets look like they were built from a mix of dollhouse furniture, vintage miniatures, and a craft store’s finest finds. It’s whimsical, but there’s grit here too. Mr. Fox’s battles with the farmers aren’t just comedic capers; they’re existential skirmishes about identity, community, and the cost of self-indulgence.
The voice cast is a cocktail of Anderson regulars and perfectly cast newcomers: Clooney’s suave confidence is balanced by streaks of insecurity, while Streep’s Felicity has a quiet steeliness, that at times melts into an matrimonial sympathy that will break your heart. Willem Dafoe turns in a sleazy, scene-stealing performance as a rat with a Southern drawl. Jason Schwartzman’s diminutive Ash has one of the greatest arcs of any character in an Anderson film, short of Schwartman’s Max Fischer in Rushmore (1998) Alexandre Desplat, working with Anderson for the first time, turns in a banjo-laced score that weaves between Burl Ives–esque whimsy and something sharper, adding to the film’s bittersweet tone.
Like much of Anderson’s work, Fantastic Mr. Fox is a story about control and chaos. It’s about parents realizing their kids might be weirder than they are, about holding on to your essential wildness without letting it consume you. It’s a family film in the sense that kids can enjoy the talking animals and chase sequences, but adults might be watching, maybe sitting beside their children, quietly reflecting on age, and remembering a type of melancholy that is always trying to get in.
Fantastic Mr. Fox
Written by Wes Anderson and Noah Baumbach; Directed by Wes Anderson
2009
87 minutes
English
Recommended way to watch (at time of publication): Streaming on Disney Plus and Hulu
You’ll like this if you like: Isle of Dogs (2018), The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), Chicken Run (2000)