Trailer: Fantastic Mr. Fox (#2)

The second trailer for Wes Anderson’s Fantastic Mr Fox has shown up online and it is nothing short of, for lack of a better word, fantastic. In comparison, the first trailer seemed to be a way to introduce the audience to the animation style with a few funny lines thrown in. The new trailer, however, completely flips the script and gives us a much better idea of what the film is about and, especially, its main character’s motivations. There are some truly funny scenes that will no doubt have you howling (my personal favorite is towards the end with Owen Wilson’s character explaining how to play “Whack Bat.” Prepare to feel good with the trailer below the jump.

Poster: Fantastic Mr. Fox

Today seems to be poster day here at Geek on Film and I’m not so sure it’s a good thing. I like seeing the art associated with a film, especially when it’s actually interesting, but nine out of ten times it is just a simple one sheet with floating heads or characters standing around – neither of which give me to say something witty.

Despite coming from a director with a truly creative and inventive vision, the posters for Wes Anderson films usually fall into the latter category. (See The Royal Tenenbaums, The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou, or The Darjeeling Limited) Now we have the poster for Fantastic Mr. Fox (thanks to FirstShowing.net) and I am again disappointed. Perhaps Anderson saves all his creativity for the films, which I am 100% okay with.

Check out the full size poster after the jump

Genius At Work: Best Actor-Director Combos

Watching Judd Apatow score another #1 if underwhelming comedy with so many familiar faces (still waiting for a Craig Robinson feature) got me thinking about some of the best combos of director and actor(s). These days it seems almost every big director has their go-to star or stars who they trust to both bring a strong performance and bank at the box office. Sometimes it works wonders (Knocked Up) and at other turns they disappoint (Funny People). But who are the best collaborators in the business today?

Trailer: Fantastic Mr. Fox

On Tuesday, I posted the link for Wes Anderson’s Fantastic Mr. Fox website and today we have the brand spanking new trailer. For those that don’t know or don’t remember, Fantastic Mr. Fox stars George Clooney, Meryl Streep, Willem Dafoe, Michael Gambon, and Brian Cox, as well as Anderson regulars Bill Murray, Jason Schwartzman, Anjelica Huston, Adrian Brody, and, of course, Owen Wilson. Here is the film synopsis from IMDb:

Mr. Fox, Mrs. Fox, and all their fox babies live under a hill under a tree, along with Badger, Rabbit, Weasel, and all of their families. To make ends meet, every night, Mr. Fox steals a meal from one of the three crooked farmers–Boggis, a chicken farmer, Bunce, who has a little bit of everything but only eats duck liver, and Bean, who farms turkeys and apples and subsists solely on apple cider. With his keen sense of smell, and the farmers’ distinctive diets, Mr. Fox has no problem evading them.

After so much treatment, the greedy farmers band together to end Mr. Fox. They ambush him at the base of his hole in the hill, and while Mr. Fox survives, his tail does not. Thus begins an obsession on the part of the farmers. They first try to dig the foxes out, but they are outdug by eight sets of paws. Then, they move to starving them out. This is unfortunate, as no other creatures living under the hill (though now more of a valley; a bulldozer was involved at one point) can get out, either. Mr. Fox is not a very popular figure until he chances across the idea of digging under the farmhouses…

Enjoy the trailer after the jump:

Photo Dump: Fantastic Mr. Fox Gets Some New Photos

Wes Anderson’s next project, Fantastic Mr. Fox (based on the Roald Dahl book of the same name), now has a website that has been made more entertaining by including a slew of new stills and production photos. The film sports a stellar cast including George Clooney, Meryl Streep, Willem Dafoe, Michael Gambon, and Brian Cox, as well as Anderson regulars Bill Murray, Jason Schwartzman, Anjelica Huston, Adrian Brody, and, of course, Owen Wilson. The film is currently in post-production and will be in theaters November 13.

Link: Fantastic Mr. Fox