Year: 2009
Running Time: 87 Minutes
Rated: PG
SRP: $ 39.99
Studio(s): 20th Century Fox
Release Date: March 23, 2010

Film/Feature: A –
If there a were ever an animated film that would be best seen with a glass of beer, Fantastic Mr. Fox would be it. Anthropomorphic animals are always fun, as long as it’s not live action, and especially if they are set in a world created by Wes Anderson (Royal Tennenbaums) and Noah Baumbach (Squid and the Whale). Actually, the story stems from a story by the late Roald Dahl, who authored James and the Giant Peach and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. But both Anderson and Baumbach are like two peas in pods, who love making films soaked in dry wit and memorable chatter, odd character idiosyncrasies and set designs as memorable as a timeless photograph. They took Dahl’s short story and put their fallen-aristocrat spin on it.

In their adaptation, the hierarchy of animals and humans exist, but this gathering of wild animals can talk and be understood by humans. Even though they live underground and in the fields and forests, they’ve evolved to to running law firms, schools, newspapers, real estate firms, and more, yest still adhering to their “natural” tendencies every once in a while.

George Clooney voices Mr. Fox, a compulsive chicken thief who makes a deal with his partner-in-crime and wife, Mrs. Fox (Meryl Streep) that he will find a new line of work if they are able to escape the clutches of an enraged squab farmer who has just caught them in the act of a heist. She reveals her pregnancy and convinces a safer line of work should be on order.

The Foxes did escape and Mr. is no longer fantastic, he is just a bored family fox, working as a community reporter for the local rag, putting those tendencies behind him and earn an honest wage. He seeks a better life for himself, his wife and son and longs to live above ground in a high rise pine, but settles for whatever local variety tree is in his price range. His son Ash (Jason Schwartzman), now a teenager, is a short and uncoordinated cub and is everything Mr. Fox is not. Ash looks up to his tall and agile father despite being ignored, but is going through the awkward stages of fpuberty and accepting his short-comings. After moving to higher ground, the family takes in Mrs. Fox’s nephew, Kristofferson (Eric Anderson) and is everything his son is not. Mr. Fox bonds instantly with Kristofferson, admiring his natural abilities and unknowingly creates a rift between he and Ash.

Prior to purchasing his new home, Mr. Fox’s attorney, Badger (Bill Murray), of Beaver, Beaver and Badger advises him not to move into the area because the tree resides near three farmers, the meanest of which is a hard Cider tycoon, Franklin Bean (Michael Gambon). Mr. Fox is tempted by his primal predilections and plans to break into each farm for one last heist. He convinces his possum superintendent Kylie (Wally Wolodarsky) to help him, but when the stakes get higher and the farmers come after him and his family, he puts everyone in danger.

Fox tries to rally those in his community, to accept their nature and do what animals do, be faithful to their Latin names, and not be afraid to embrace those gifts. It’s a cute and valid notion, if living in the wild. Yet the three pieced suits, landscape paintings, and patterned wallpaper tends to contradict all of that. The farmers and their workers, act more like animals than the animals, and therein lies the conundrum. Call it the evolution of the tale of the Tortoise and Scorpion. (Look it up.)

But back to that glass of beer, while I don’t believe it’s a film that’s aimed at youths, the script makes sure that they can safely view it too replacing every swear word with the word, “cuss” adding another whimsical detail in a fully-accessorized world that would put Barbie to shame, down to every piece of miniature china. Not all films that are animated should be aimed at kids or as seen in Where the Wild Things Are, some material is best suited for those who have lived a bit. Animation though, is just another way to tell a story, simple as that.

Aesthetically, by using the stop-motion technique of animation and puppeteering, Fantastic Mr. Fox achieves a hybrid, nostalgic look of the original King Kong and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Every now and then there’s a wave of movement in the fur of the animals, a blustery flap of the collar, or coy shrug of the shoulder that signals Fantastic Mr. Fox is an Anderson film first even though it features the work of endless hours of work done by fabulous countless animators. Clooney is extraordinarily good as the lead (when isn’t he?), Anderson gets the most out of Murray and Schwartzman yet again, and even surprise voices like Willem Dafoe as Fox’s adversary The Rat, and Owen Willson as Coach Skip will tug at the corner of your upper lip. Anderson and Baumbach always makes the droll and cynical perspective so interesting and well, for the lack of a better word, fantastic, wait, scratch that, fun, and that’s why we hang on every single word and take in every single scene like pieces of baroque bark so that packrats like myself can add them to my internal movie scrapbook.

Video: A+
This film is all about texture! Every single texture was captured on this 1080p AVC-encoded transfer in 1.85:1 aspect ratio so well that you could see the type of knit in the floor mats, wool looked like wool, and every strand of animal fur could be counted by pausing the screen. The Nikon D3 was used to make this film and it’s a great advertisement for that camera. As heard on the extras, green and blue were, for the most part, taken out of the color palette leaving just the warm reds, oranges, violets and golden amber hues along with lots of brown to convey an autumn feel. For instance, Farmer Bean’s Cider storage is completely lit by passing light through the cider-filled bottles. There’s a lot of detail in the 150 different sets full of miniatures and neatly organized clutters and not a single piece or strand is missed.

Audio: B+
Fantastic Mr. Fox owns a 5.1 English DTS-HD Master Audio track. I was a bit underwhelmed by the amount of surround movement initially as a lot of what I would think would comes from the front, but as the film continued into the later stages, there was much more activity than in the first half. Bass has a balanced thrust in a handful of scenes, more than you’d expect, less than what you desire. Dialogue is clear to understand, even at low levels and as expected, a Wes Anderson film wouldn’t be complete without a moody, eclectic score composed by Alexadre Desplat and a soundtrack that includes the Beach Boys, Art Tatum, Burl Ives. Other audio selections include: French, Spanish, and Portuguese 5.1 Dolby Digital tracks and subtitles are available in English SDH, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, and Chinese-Mandarin.

Extras:C+
Lots of potential is wasted here but the best we get here is a lengthy and fairly comprehensive Making of and lots of empty room on the disc that could have held some more substantial extras. I know that there has been less emphasis on menu design, but this is about as dull as it gets, folks. One still shot that shows a bit spoiler, no music, or animation. Also I have to take them down a point or two for not having any subtitles for the extras. Hey, deaf people want to be able to enjoy the extras too.

Disc One
Making Mr. Fox Fantastic HD (44:48) is broken into six parts but can be viewed all together as well. They are:

The Look of Fantastic Mr. Fox (8:12) – See how Roald Dahl’s books and Donald Chaffin’s concept art influenced the set designers and puppeteers, in addition to Wes Anderson’s meticulous aesthetics.

From Script to Screen (7:00) – taking Dahl’s one act story into a three-act film.

The Puppet Makers (8:21) – See the step-by-step process of how the puppets are made and how they move.

Still Life (Puppet Animation) (7:23) – the difference in feel of a stop motion film as opposed to a traditionally animated film is explained such as communicating through body language with characters that are covered in fur. The look they were trying to achieve was a bit of the original King Kong look where there was real-looking fur that would ripple in the wind so it’s not as smooth as say how Coraline looked. Also these animators rely on storyboards so much more because there’s a “one take” attitude.

The Cast (6:34) – Not just your typical rundown of the cast, this bit sees how the actors filmed scenes out for the recording of the audio with all of the actors in one shot acting with each other as opposed to recording different audio tracks. In a sense the full movie was shot like a film just to capture that audio for a different sound quality and feel.

Bill and His Badger (7:37)Bill Murray gets to know his character, Badger better and learns a thing or two about stop motion animation.

A Beginner’s Guide to Whack-Bat HD (1:12) In case you missed it in the film, here’s another quick rundown on Whack-Bat.

Fantastic Mr. Fox: The World of Roald Dahl HD (3:00) Wes Anderson takes you on the tour of Roald Dahl’s life with his Dahl’s wife, Felicity and his estate where Anderson visited to write the screenplay. Dahl’s other books include Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, James and the Giant Peach, and Mathilda. His quirks and personality made their way into the film after Anderson took a deeper look into the man he was. Sadly, this feature seems like it’s been pulled from the Making of instead of a separate, more substantial biography would have been more desirable here honestly.

Theatrical Trailer HD (2:27)

Disc Two
Included in this combo package is the DVD of the film and I can’t praise this option enough as a consumer who uses a variety of electronics at home and on the road.

Disc Three
As stated above, included is yet another way to view the film and that’s by digitally downloading the film onto your iPod or media player and you’re given a sheet with a code that’s valid for the file transfer.

Overall Shock Value: A–
Here’s the most important question: Do you like Wes Anderson films? If you answered “yes,” then you will enjoy this film. It has all of the charm of his past films, from the title cards in the Futura font to the obligatory Rolling Stones song. It’s hard not to crack a wide grin from the opening credits to the close, because every single minute is likable and so much amusing that I wanted to watch it over and over, and I can, now that it’s on blu-ray. I just wished there was more extras than what we were given. The featurette on Dahl was practically borrowed from the bigger feature, and missing was a Wes Anderson commentary which I’ve grown accustomed to. My recommendation? Cuss Yes Buy It!

Feature: C

Osbourne Cox (John Malkovich) is a miserable man who is introduced as he is being fired by the CIA. His wife, Katie (Tilda Swinton) has tired of him and his antics, but mostly because he’s home now and she has to try a little harder to maintain the secrecy of her affair with Harry Pfarrer (George Clooney). Pfarrer seems to be haunted by his own personal demons as the average slime bucket, and suspects someone is following him. He lies, he cheats and preys on insecure women on the internet. Which brings us to Linda Litzke (Frances McDormand), a struggling personal trainer with no money, no man and is obsessed with keeping a youthful appearance. Litzke’s boss Ted (Richard Jenkins) discourages these ideas of hers because he holds a deep affection for her. Litzke’s sidekick, Chad Feldheimer (Brad Pitt) encourages her ploys but both of them are like bumbling clowns, unable to get out of each other’s way. What do these two groups of people have in common? Absolutely nothing but their paths converge in a silly but genuinely entertaining way concerning a compact disc of information.

The plot shifts into overdrive once Pfarrer and Feldheimer do meet briefly and at that point the story is driving without brakes. Cox inner and outer alcoholic shows up as he begins to catch on, Litzke becomes a reckless wreck and yes, the CIA is still involved. I know not what inspired Ethan and Joel Coen to come up with this film. It’s an odd, yet comedic effort on par with earlier collaboration on Intolerable Cruelty or the Ladykillers.

Is there a point to the Coen’s latest film? Are they trying to say something about the CIA or personal trainers specifically? I doubt it. I think they just tried to take two different worlds and put them in a very bizarre situations. The two groups of people would never come up in a conversation otherwise. It does show how desperation and a lack of money can drive someone to cast aside logic and act stupidly. But are you really acting stupidly if you are inherently stupid, or are you just acting within the limits of your capacity? And is this what we have to look forward to in our forties?

Still, I enjoyed the what Jenkins, Swinton, and Pitt brought to the film. McDormand, Clooney, and Malkovich do not disappoint, but do they really ever? The story however may not be enough to satisfy film buffs. It’s like biting into a gorgeous apple turnover covered in powdered sugar and tasting only a few chunks of fruit. The right taste is there but it just needs more, a lot more.

Presentation C+

First thing I do now every time I watch a Universal blu-ray is go to the set-up screen and turn OFF the button sounds. Packaging is basic and so is the menu as far as Subtitles are available in English SDH (Subtitled for the Dead and Hard-of-Hearing, Spanish, and French.

Video: B+

Burn After Reading exhibits more bright scenes than dark ones. The 1080P/AVC-MPEG 4 transfer has lots of detail to view and some scenes are set up with lots of depth to them. Nothing particular is distracting or artificial to complain as far as the transfer goes. But I’ll add that there’s nothing to marvel at either. I will say that this is the first film that shows Pitt has significantly aged since his more notable landmark roles, and high definition does nothing to hide that. It does play nicely into portraying a middle-aged physical trainer who is aware of how to keep young but really has only succeeded in keeping his mind young at heart.

Audio: B-

The 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio is a bit wasted here since there’s no showcase scene to speak of where all that juice could be put to use. All is quiet on Subwoofer Lane, as is Surrounds Street. It’s almost all dialogue and music from the center and fronts with some panning effects as cars drive by. Normally I expect most Universal DTS-HD tracks to have a much deft and weight and this plays like a small film on all levels but that was the original design of the film itself. It doesn’t aspire to be much more than a chatty film and it accomplishes that with no technical deficiencies.

Extras: D

Either the Coen Brothers just despise the home format of films or they or the studio just does not want to put any money or effort in doing real extras. Not that this is a film that you’d expect to have 9 hours of footage, but something that resembles a sincere embrace of the blu-ray or DVD would be nice or perhaps yet another deluxe release of the Big Lebowski.

What we do find on Burn After Reading are three extras sliced from a single EPK (for some cable movie promotion channel I’m sure). Why all three clips were not just condensed into on 20 minute clip is beyond me. Anyway, Finding the Burn (5:31) is mostly the Coen Brothers finding a way to describe what the films is about. DC Insiders Run Amuch (12:24) speaks briefly about casting Pitt, McDormand, Malkovich, and the set design. I don’t understand why they isolated Welcome Back George (2:51) when it’s clear it belongs in with the previous feature because the only people who contribute to it are the Coen Brothers and the costume designer. It’s about trying to dork Clooney up in normal clothes and the Coens repeatedly writing idiot roles for him.

BD-Live features

The only thing offered as far as high def exclusives are is the insignificant My Scenes features where you can clip out your favorite scenes and post them in your BD-Live network to your friends. Even the patented Universal U-Control is even absent on this disc. Sorry folks, there’s just not much here to speak of.

Overall Shock Value: C+

Burn After Reading is a simple film about middle-aged simpletons in two completely unrelated professions acting very unprofessional. After the cerebral cat and mouse chase of No Country for Old Men, the Coen Brothers take a bizarre trip with this dark and twisted comedy that’s a little light on calories compared to what’s on the rest of their menu; but it definitely belongs there because I don’t? believe it belongs anywhere else. While it doesn’t make an overwhelming impression. It’s the type of Coen Brother film that will probably get a nice following on cable television and be one of those movies you can’t help but watch over and over again whenever it’s on. The short running time could make it easily into many half or full-day blu-ray Coen marathons for completists but a sparse selection of extras, it’s a rental recommendation for everyone else.