Good film seems more Wes Anderson and less Roald Dahl

Rating: 6/10 (28 December 2009)

Wes Anderson takes a Rolad Dahl film and makes it his own. There is no getting around it this is an Anderson film except animated. If you don't like Anderson's style then just stay away. If you do, then give it a shot. The plot has George Clooney's Fox settling down with Meyrl Streep when she is pregnant. Years later he's a columnist for a newspaper and is feeling middle aged. He moves his family into a new house and despite promising his wife never to steal chickens again, he begins to go back to his old ways which precipitates a war with the three biggest farmers in the country. An amusing film filled with angst and humor and Anderson's skewed view of life. If Anderson sold this as a kids film he has proved once again how dense the people in Hollywood really are since the vast majority of this film would go over most kid's heads. I like the film but I don't see it as the be all and end all, certainly I wouldn't put as the front runner for this years animated Oscar. My problems with the film stem from the films rambling nature which took up much of the first half. Once the war starts the film seems to settle down, though to me the ending, which was cribbed from Dahl's notes seems an after thought. I do like that Clooney's lead is very fallible, but at the same time he is kind of a jerk and more than once I wanted to shout at the screen questions about why everyone was still around him. Reservations aside this is very much worth seeing if you like Anderson's style.