Consider this your official thread for Wes Anderson's Fantastic Mr. Fox. What are your favorite moments, themes, and compositions? How do you think this film relates to the rest of Anderson's filmography? Is the book better than the movie? Discuss!
I have a hard time deciding between this and Moonrise as my favorite Anderson film. I took my son to see this, he was in between 3 and 4 at the time, and I remember it being the first feature film he sat through without complaint and had a good time with.
I love everything about this movie. How Mr. Fox eats his toast, how the animals "cuss" at each other, how Mr. Bean comes flying in at the end of the folk heist song and berates Petey for his weak songwriting, and how he flies into a rage and destroys his RV. I love how they made Mr. Fox a prick but he's still immensely charming and you still root for him. I love the shot gun lesson on martial arts, the explanation for "Whack Bat", and how everyone's fur squiggles and dances from the stop motion. Mostly I like it because it cemented the idea that had been growing in my head post-high school, in which you can be cool and successful, being a weirdo nowadays.
I have to agree. It explicitly plays on those same Anderson-y themes that are in all of his other films, but it allows his detail-oriented (read: OCD) nature to fully come through. There something to be said about Anderson creating an animated film in which he still gets to shoot everything live. It's brilliantly him.
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