The Fantastic Mr Fox (2009) Fantastic Film, Even Better Extras (Review)

Roald Dahl was one of the greatest writers of children’s stories, his stories have captured and enthralled children since his first children’s tale “Gremlins” in 1943. The Fantastic Mr Fox first published in 1970 finally made its way to the screen in 2009 when Wes Anderson adapted it brilliantly with stop motion animation. Now this new print on Blu-ray from The Criterion Collection gives you a chance to relive or enjoy the tales of Mr Fox again or for the first time.

The Fantastic Mr Fox’s adventures are brought to life by Wes Anderson with the help of some pretty impressive vocal talent George Clooney (who is definitely channelling his Danny Ocean persona from Oceans 11) as Mr Fox, Meryl Streep as Mrs Fox, as well as other notables like Bill Murray, Owen Wilson  Willem Dafoe, Michael Gambon and even Jarvis Cocker, the list goes on after that.

The story follows Mr Fox, the greatest chicken thief around, as he evades, outwits and outsmarts the plans of the farmers, Boggis, Bunce and Bean, these are the three local farmers that Mr Fox steals from. Along the way he gets into many scrapes loses his tail to a shotgun blast while the farmers destroy his home sending him underground while they wait for him to appear. It is once underground that Mr Fox hatches his plans and using his amazing memory, he convinces Badger, mice, rabbits and assorted woodland creatures to help him and themselves to live happily underground together. Leaving the farmers waiting above ground for Mr Fox to show up, which of course he never does. It is a charming, heartwarming story, with everything you would expect from any Dahl story.

The animation is sublime and fits the story perfectly. The attention to detail on every one of the puppets and every frame of film shot is exquisite, even down to the movement of the hair on the animal’s bodies and when you consider this is stop motion that is no mean feat.

It’s probably obvious that I’m a fan of the works of Mr Dahl, I have been since I was a child and even more so in having children of my own. This is a perfect family film there is enough high jinks and laughter to keep the kids happy while also touching upon some more serious issues to keep the adults happy.

This is a Criterion Collection edition so as well as containing a clean HD print we also have deep pockets full of special features; there is an Animatic which gives us the full storyboards for the film rendered with music and voices, this is a fascinating insight into the pre-production process. There are a series of Making of features that are really interesting, especially the recording of the voices where we see Clooney et al running around the farm, not cooped up in a recording studio.  It would appear that the actors actually acted out their parts for real rather than just doing voices, I’m sure if they pieced all this footage together a live-action version of the film could be very interesting.

There is also a video using time-lapse photography to show a whirlwind version of the 20 something days that each scene took to film, which is a treat to watch.  There are also documentaries on the puppets, art, music and miniatures all of which give a huge insight into how much work goes into a film of this type.

An audio-only section where we are treated to Roald Dahl himself reading the entire story. If that’s not enough there is a section containing speeches from the award ceremonies, set photos, publicity features, a discussion about the film by two very young film students, a new documentary about the fantastic Mr Dahl and scanned images of pages from Dahl’s original manuscript for Mr Fox.

As if that wasn’t enough the director’s commentary by Wes Anderson, from 2013, is well worded and shows a lot of love for the source material. Finally, the inclusion of a new animation of Petey voiced by Jarvis Cocker introducing us to the film is absolutely perfect if only for the line, “I play Petey, by the way, a small role but I do sing a song”, to round off the film is a masterclass on adapting a classic children’s story.  The wonderful array of special features just go to show how much work went into making sure the story was given the treatment it deserves.

All in all, if you’ve seen the film this will be a great addition to your blu-ray collection,  if you haven’t seen it,  this could be your chance to own and see a classic with the best collection of extra features imaginable, and before you say “oh, but it’s just a kids film” don’t, nothing Dahl ever did was just for kids. His stories never treat children as children, he speaks to them with respect which is what makes his work so accessible to everyone, young or old. 

THANKS FOR READING GAV’S REVIEW OF THE FANTASTIC MR FOX

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