ISLE OF DOGS**** Dog gone wonderful

THIS IS ANOTHER stunningly inventive, richly original and thoroughly charming movie from Wes Anderson. It’s insightful, very witty and beautifully shot. Executed entirely in stop motion animation (that most tedious of movie making styles that took Anderson almost two years to finish) the story is located in Megasaki City, a canton of Japan, sometime in the near future. There the humans mainly speak Japanese (subtitled when you need it; more often than not you can get the drift of the conversations) and the dogs ‘speak’ American.

And there, the town is run by Mayor Kobayashi (Kunichi Nomura from “the Grand Budapest Hotel”), a cat lover, and petty demagogue with the snarl and viciousness of a Mafia don. Mayor Kobayashi has decided that due to a (largely fake news) canine epidemic, humans are no longer safe from dogs. His fiery rhetoric demonizes man’s best friend, all of which are rounded up, caged and shipped off to a deserted island that’s the city’s polluted rubbish dump. Put it another way: The dogs are treated like garbage

What he didn’t reckon with is Atari (Koyu Rankin), his 12 year old adopted and heavily guarded ward. Spots, Atari’s state appointed guard dog has also been caged and shipped off; and Atari (having bravely stolen a battered puddle jumper aircraft) journeys to the island in search of his friend. He’s an unlikely hero: kinda nerdy, family to the dastardly Kobayashi, and with no agenda other than to find his dog.

There he meets the lead pack (or in human terms, Bryan Cranston, Edward Norton, Bob Balaban, Bill Murray and Jeff Goldblum) along with that foxiest of dogs (Scarlett Johansson). After some inter-canine debate they agree to assist him in his search, and this group of underdogs begin their Odyssey

It’s not to abstruse to relate this story (of dog ostracism) to the populists’ demonisations and disenfranchisements of The Others and their need to cast them out, be they Mexicans, West Indians, Rohingya, Muslims or sundry refugees. Through cartoon exaggeration (and the fact that it’s a Japanese’s nemesis) Anderson summarises every modern tin-pot dictator, from Putin to Trump in his brilliantly realised Mayor Kobayashi. It’s done with the lightest of touches…without a trace of proselytising.

The whole glorious enterprise is energised by what’s obvious in the title (when spoken aloud). Atari, his secret admirer Tracy (Greta Gerwig), and his pack of canine helpers are all driven by the shared values of loyalty and nothing more complicated than the need for love and companionship. They form a Quixotic coalition of samurai driven by this love and the need to do what’s honourable and right. It’s a simple thought that, expressed in a more conventional tale, would simply seem banal. But in the unassuming form of a ‘child’s cartoon’, the cliché “love conquers all” assumes a significance that elevates it to something both touching and timeless.

Anderson wrote the movie with his regular collaborators, Jason Schwartzman and Kunichi Nomura along with producer Roman Coppola and a grab bag of outstanding art directors and animators: Curt Enderle from “the Boxtrolls”, Paul Harrod, Adam Stockhausen (who also ‘did’ “Ready Player One”) and modellers Charles Fletcher (“Fantastic Mr. Fox”), Ian Mackinnon (“Mars Attacks”) and others.

He’s also brought together a dynamic troupe of actors to voice his creations (most of which were voiced as a group…as opposed to the modern approach of solo v/o’s cut together in a studio) such as Frances McDormand, Harvel Keitel, F. Murray Abraham, Yoko Ono, Tilda Swinton, Ken Watanabe , Live Schreiber and Courtney B Vance (apart from those mentioned above)

There has been some carping about cultural appropriation. But it’s misdirected. With “Isle of Dogs”, the director has definitely been barking up the right tree.


ISLE OF DOGS. Dir: Wes Anderson. Written by: Anderson and Jason Schwartzman from a story by Kunichi Nomura and Roman Coppola. With: Bryan Cranston, Edward Norton, Bob Balaban, Bill Murray, Jeff Goldblum, Greta Gerwig, Frances McDormand, Scarlett Johansson, Harvey Keitel etc. Cinematographer: Tristan Oliver (“Fantastic Mr.Fox”). Composer: Alexandre Desplat (“The Shape of Water”)