Fantastic Mr. Fox Cinema Review

A movie that should appeal to all ages, Wes Anderson’s animated featured looks set to be a big hit.

Anderson has a reputation of making interesting, quirky, slightly surreal films populated with weird and wonderful characters so this is probably as straightforward a movie that he could make.

Fantastic Mr Fox is a tale about a groovy fox, voiced by George Clooney, who comes up with a daring plan to steal from three nearby farmers.

Ronald Dahl’s original book was very short so Anderson had plenty of scope to add his own spin and making it run to a feature length.

The film introduces us to a cast of lovable characters with even the baddies bringing a smile to your face. Watch out for the Rat character voiced by Willem Dafoe and also Petey an animated version of Jarvis Cocker, voiced by the ex Pulp frontman.

Animated films these days typically have some big hitters voicing the characters and this was no different with Bill Murray (Badger), Meryl Streep (Mrs Fox), Willem Dafoe (Rat) and Owen Wilson (Coach Skip). Even Anderson gets in on the act as the voice of Weasel.

The animation is lush, sumptuous and looks amazing and Anderson’s screenplay ensures plenty of laughs along the way with some great simple but pleasing flourishes throughout the movie.

While a few of the big budget animations of recent years have been successful to a certain extent in bridging the children and adults divide they have arguably been for adults who still quite like cartoons. Fantastic Mr Fox is definitely worth giving a go even if cartoons do not typically hold your attention for too long.

In cinemas from Friday 23rd October 2009.