Fantastic Mr Fox (2009)

The stop motion animation from Wes Anderson sees a telling of the classic Roald Dahl children’s tale of Fantastic Mr Fox. With an all star voice cast including George Clooney as Mr Fox, Meryl Streep as his wife with Jason Schwartzman as Ash, Bill Murray as Badger, Willem Dafoe, Owen Wilson and others. The film follows the book in a basic way with several alterations, these are needed when converting a book for the big screen.

When you have a film adapted from a book, if you know the book you always compare what they left out and what they added to see if you as a fan of the book agree. Well I like what they did with the additions, I have to say that the very end of the book while very unrealistic is how I imagine the ending everytime but that would not work in a film sense. The additions of the challenges between son and the cousin is good and interesting and I think that overall the story and additions lead to a good film. I did not like the wearing clothes but still being animal, especially with the eating, did not work for me I prefer the full animal or the full animal acting like an animal.

The animation is the next thing with this film and I have to say that it bothered me on some level. They tried to get the realistic movement with the stop motion and overall the look of it was good but what the fur does just got to me and I did not like it. That being said overall this film is a middle of the road venture, some good things some not so good, but due to the love of the original story which they honour this is an above average film so a 6 out of 10 for me.

Ghostbusters (1984)

This is the 1984 film, I have seen this film many times and love it as one of my favorite films of the 1980's, I heard a rumour that it was getting re-released on the big screen on a limited release and I was quite keen to see it. However there a showing in Glasgow so I made my way through to see it on the big screen. It was well worth the extra effort to see this classic on the big screen I loved the experience of seeing Dan Ackroyd, Bill Murry, Harold Ramis, Sigourney Weaver, Rick Moranis, Ernie Hudson, Annie Potts and William Atherton play out a story I knew so well.

It is not a remastered version so you can see some of the effects showing up quite badly on the big screen in today's digital world however this did not detract from my experience. Also this is by no means a perfect film, the story itself is great but back in the 80's they kept to your basic story structure, you have the main characters, the set up of their position and then the situation for them to sort out. It is simple and works and the jokes and one liners keep flowing.

If you have not seen this film yet I would recommend it, if you have seen it before and get the chance to see it on the big screen I would recommend it, possibly not the best option if you have never seen it before as it does not look great. The experience for me is 4 star, if they cleaned up the effects I would give it 5 on the big screen. Let me know what you think of it and here is hoping for the sequel to be released next year.