RANGO (2011)

Rango

6/10

Starring
Johnny Depp
Isla Fisher
Bill Nighy
Abigail Breslin
Alfred Molina
Harry Dean Stanton
Timothy Olyphant


Directed by Gore Verbinski

This movie may not be popular with the toddlers but with the young and young at heart it is a good watch.

Throughout this film, an owl mariachi band provides commentary that makes you smile.

Rango is a computer-animated comedy western film. A nice cool movie, that I believe it is a little over-rated. The comedy in the movie is not for kids, but the movie wakes up a genre that I believe is long forgotten, western cartoons.

It was a critical and commercial success making $ 245 million dollars from a $ 130 million dollars budget and it also won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature.

The high note in this movie is the imaginative lies concocted by Rango to fool the town’s people.

The story line goes a pet chameleon (Johnny Depp) becomes accidentally stranded in the Mojave Desert after his terrarium falls from its owner's car. 

After meeting an armadillo named Roadkill (Alfred Molina), who is seeking the mystical Spirit of the West.

There in the desert he narrowly avoids eaten by a red-tailed hawk and runs into a desert iguana named Beans (Isla Fisher), a rancher's daughter, who takes him to Dirt, an Old West town populated by desert animals.

There Rango introduces himself and the lies start, which takes him as high as the Sheriff of the town before bringing him down.

The Director made a lot of references to old time Western movies from A Fistful of Dollars, Chinatown, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, right down to Once Upon a Time in the West, and more.

Johnny Depp delivered as usual, making his mark and a difference in the adaptation of the character. He had 20 days in which to voice Rango; and the filmmakers scheduled the supporting actors to interact with him during those days.

The whole imaginative lies of the main character are fun though, and it was fun watching it all crumble down, i guess that part of the movie is for the kids, to learn that lies breeds more lies till they all catch you in a twill.

This is not the first film that has brought director Gore Verbinski and Johnny Depp together, as they both worked together on the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy. This is Verbinski first animation and also the productions company responsible for the animations Industrial Light and Magic first extended feature-film work.

This is a movie I did enjoy and one I know you will too.