A few months ago, when the first trailer for "Fantastic Mr. Fox" came out, I thought it looked promising from the start. I have to admit I'll watch any stop motion animation, as a brief survey of my DVD shelf will attest. ("Wallace and Gromit" is just too good.) When I found out that Wes Anderson was going to be the director, I got a little leery of it, simply because my feelings for his movies are mixed, at best. "Rushmore" was okaaaay, I *hated* "The Royal Tenenbaums" the first time, I fell asleep on "...Life Aquatic." To the great frustration of my friend Alice, "Darjeeling Limited" didn't work for me either. His movies are always really twee and sort of precious, and while I can dig twee and precious (I *do* like Belle and Sebastian, after all), his movies always seemed really artificial and strained before, and I just couldn't make myself care about any of the characters.
Well, it turns out that this trademark style translates really well to animation and Roald Dahl. I enjoyed every bit of "Fantastic Mr. Fox." I'm not sure if it is a movie that will translate very well to children, but children can pick up on higher concepts faster than most adults realize.
So go see "Fantastic Mr. Fox." You'll leave the theater smiling. And possibly dancing.
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