Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)
So I saw Fantastic Mr Fox again after years with my brother and a friend. We are not to sure about the friend, but we had a blast re-watching it.
Even now, many makers cannot match the stop-motion craftsmanship of ‘Fanstastic Mr Fox’. The animation is so freaking fabulous, the sequences so smoothly executed, that new viewers going blind into the film might not even realize the sets and characters are hand-made.
Based on a book by Roald Dahl, Fantastic Mr Fox follows a sly Fox (voiced by George Clooney) forced to abandon a life of crime by his wife (Meryl Streep) for a mundane job as a newspaper columnist after they almost lose their life in a heist. However, after years of peace, Mr Fox turns back to his old ways, targeting three greedy farmers Boggis, Bunce, and Bean, which ultimately puts his entire family and community in danger.
Much of the drama and laughter in the first half of Fantastic Mr Fox is generated by the arrival of his nephew Kristofferson, a talented boy who immediately wins over not just Mr and Mrs Fox, but becomes the new star athlete at school. This sparks a lot of envy in Ash Fox, Mr Fox’s son, and he starts to heavily resent his cousin. But when bigger problems arrive in their lives, both boys become friends. This transformation is comically cute.
Fantastic Mr Fox is laden with casual pauses, and awkward exchanges, which would’ve been tedious to watch in a different film, but it’s delightfully charming here. And the funniest element is how the characters use the word ‘cuss’ instead of the ‘f’ word to keep things family-friendly. So if someone is angry, they’ll say ‘oh cuss off’, or ‘don’t be a cussing idiot’.
Interestingly, like the wealthy and vindictive farmers, Fantastic Mr Fox is driven by greed and an insatiable desire for a bigger, better life, which leads him to steal. Each successful burglary only fuels his ambition; he never knows when to stop. In the film’s second half, the farmers retaliate by trapping Mr Fox, his accomplices, his family, and every animal underground, intending to smoke them out and kill them, or leave them to starve. Will the clever fox outwit them?
The climactic suspense over the fates of the animals is executed is a theatrical yet hilarious manner. The rich farmers pool in all their resources to take on the Fox, yet find themselves at their wits end to finish him off.
If you love stop animation and are a patient viewer, this is a gem of a film.
Rating: 9 on 10. Watch ‘Fantastic Mr Fox’ on Disney+/JioHotstar