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| From left: Chief (Bryan Cranston), King (Bob Balaban), Atari Kobayashi (Koyu Rankin), Boss (Bill Murray), Rex (Edward Norton), and Duke (Jeff Goldblum) in "Isle of Dogs" Photo Credit: Imdb.com |
Director Wes Anderson is someone who specializes in films revolving around quirky, dysfunctional individuals, such as in his comedies “The Royal Tenenbaums,” “Moonrise Kingdom,” and “The Grand Budapest Hotel.” While most of his movies are live-action, he tried his hand at stop-motion animation back in 2009 with “Fantastic Mr. Fox,” an adaptation of Roald Dahl’s children’s novel, for which Anderson provided whimsical characters, intelligent humor, a heartfelt story, and gorgeous animation.
Anderson now ventures into stop-motion animation for a second time with his new film, “Isle of Dogs.” While it doesn’t quite match the quality of some of Anderson’s more-recent films, it’s still a delightful treat for moviegoers.
In a dystopian Japan, an outbreak of dog flu spreads across the canine population. As a result, the government enforces that all dogs be sent to Trash Island, in order for society to avoid further contamination. On the island, Chief (Bryan Cranston), Rex (Edward Norton), Duke (Jeff Goldblum), Boss (Bill Murray), and King (Bob Balaban) are five dogs who’ve banded together to survive. After some time passes, a young boy, Atari Kobayashi (Koyu Rankin), lands his plane on the island to find his dog, Spots (Liev Schreiber). Atari soon teams up with these five canines to locate his best friend.
The voice cast is filled with talented performers, many of whom are frequent collaborators with Anderson. They all continue to work well together, and each actor’s voice is a great fit for their character, which shows how Anderson has a talent for building an ensemble. The standout, of course, is Cranston. His character’s given the most-emotional arc in the film, and his voice conveys the painful past that he’s experienced before arriving on the island.
Although the voice cast offers superb work, one issue with the ensemble is how, even though there are many respected actors in this film, Anderson’s screenplay writes them in such a way that makes them rather forgettable. They’re all given some humorous dialogue here and there, but as characters, there’s not that much to them. The only two characters that have memorable arcs are Chief and Atari because when they become separated from the other four dogs at one point in the movie, this portion of the story allows for some heartwarming character-building between these two.
Even with the so-so work with a majority of the characters, the narrative offers a detailed look into the environment of the island, which adds much to the setting’s mystique and helps you become invested the world that this film creates. There’s also an intriguing subplot about a foreign-exchange student (Greta Gerwig) who tries to uncover a governmental conspiracy that concerns the controversial “Trash Island” decree.
One of the neat aspects of the film is how, in order to emphasize how humans and dogs can’t understand one another, Anderson has Atari speak Japanese without the use of subtitles, which places us in the perspective of the dogs and helps us develop a stronger connection with their task of helping Atari find Spots.
A fascinating similarity between “Fantastic Mr. Fox” and “Isle of Dogs” is that they contain animals who not only have some humanistic traits, but also conflicts pertaining to their animalistic instincts. While this is explored with more depth in “Fantastic Mr. Fox,” “Isle of Dogs” still touches upon it in a couple of scenes involving Chief’s character, which helps give his background more emotional weight than those of the other canine characters.
As a director, Anderson provides the film with his signature quirk at which you can’t help but smile, but some of the quirkiness proves to be a bit unnecessary at times. However, despite this occasional overabundance of quirk, he doesn’t hesitate to go into darker territory from time to time, just like in his other films.
Besides the mostly clever humor, you have to admire the film’s stunning animation, where you can see the dedication to detail that Anderson puts into his characters and settings, all of which immerse you in this futuristic adventure.
“Isle of Dogs” may have some flaws, but if you’re a fan of Anderson’s work, you won’t be able to help but sit, stay, and enjoy.
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