Fantastic Mr. Fox

Fantastic Mr. Fox

Wes Anderson has long been one of my favorite directors. Rushmore is one of my favorite films, and I honestly can't think of a single one of his films that I didn't at least moderately enjoy (yes, evenDarjeeling Limited). That being said, I think that Fantastic Mr. Fox is his most accessible film, and may even be his best.

Mr. Fox (voiced by George Clooney) put his days of poultry theft behind him when he settled down with his beloved wife (Meryl Streep) to raise a family. But familial bliss, and a career as a writer for the local newspaper isn't enough for him. Feeling unfulfilled, he packs up his wife and his strange, not particularly cool son Ash (Jason Schwartzman) and moves them out of their hole and into a bigger, and better, tree. The only problem is that this tree is in full view of the farms of Boggis, Bunce and Bean, the three meanest, most vicious farmers in the area. The temptation is too great for Mr. Fox and he soon goes back to his thieving ways, enlisting the help of his friend Kylie (Wally Wolodarsky) and his nephew Kristofferson (Eric Anderson) in a series of ever more difficult capers.

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The Men Who Stare at Goats

The Men Who Stare at Goats

I really wanted to like The Men Who Stare at Goats. It has a couple of my favorite actors in it (GeorgeClooney and Jeff Bridges) and I love a good story about secret government research, especially when they're researching turning soldiers into "Jedi warriors." It all sounds promising, and turns out to be disappointing.

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The Boat that Rocked (aka Pirate Radio)

The Boat that Rocked (aka Pirate Radio)
If you take a cracking soundtrack, marry it to a likable cast, a few good jokes and a fun, if historically inaccurate, plot you'll end up with something like The Boat that Rocked. In other words, you'll get a fun film that is ultimately pretty inconsequential.

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Land of the Lost

Land of the Lost

Have you ever wondered what it'd be like to be lost in another dimension? One that was full of dinosaurs, and ape men and lizard men and all kinds of other weird stuff? You have? Really? Now the real question is, have you ever wondered what it'd be like to do it if you were completely high? Or are you high right now? Do you like to get high? Wanna get high? Because that's pretty much what Land of the Lost wants to know. Right now.

Disgraced paleontologist Rick Marshall (Will Ferrell) has a theory about time warping and has a problem with Matt Lauer. Which has left him teaching children at a museum with his research assistant Holly (Anna Friel). She encourages him to continue his research into building a tachyon amplifier by showing him a fossil that somehow has the imprint of his lighter in it. Upon completion of the amplifier they journey to the place where she found the fossil, and join up with guide Will Stanton (Danny McBride) on a mission into a parallel dimension filled with dinosaurs, the lizard like Sleestaks, and ape like Pakuni, along with a host of historical anachronisms that are explained by the "time warp" effects. They have to work together with Chaka, a Pakuni to survive the horrors of this "land of the lost" and return home to their own dimension.

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Fantastic Fest

Way back at the end of September I made the trip south to Austin, Texas and the world famous Alamo Drafthouse for Fantastic Fest. Fantastic Fest is the "largest genre film festival in the United States." Basically it's eight days of movie geek insanity with frequent trips into horror, science fiction, action, and fantasy. If you love movies it's pretty much an overdose of your favorites. Combine the movies with the location (only the best theater in the country in my opinion) and all the other events (like parties, the Fantastic Debates, Fantastic Feud and others) and it's just plain awesome.

I managed to see 30 movies during the festival, with a huge range in both style and quality, ranging everywhere from the super low budget, will never get a release, (Yesterday) to stuff that's since then come out to be great hits in wide release (Zombieland) and everything in between. I still plan on writing about at least a few of the films here so keep an eye out for that. On the whole I quite enjoyed the festival programming, and would highly enjoy going again. Or if you know, someone wanted to open a Drafthouse in Utah I wouldn't exactly be upset.