Fantastic Mr. Fox

All of director Wes Anderson’s cool quirks and characteristics follow him into the land of stop-motion animation with this charmer, an eye-popping, hilarious adaptation of the Roald Dahl children’ book. This is essentially a Wes Anderson movie (Rushmore, Bottle Rocket) where eccentric humans are replaced by eccentric figurines. It even has the trademark awesome Anderson soundtrack featuring artists like the Rolling Stones and Jarvis Cocker. The title character, a plucky fox, is voiced by the eternally funny George Clooney, who embodies Mr. Fox with a devilish charm and sense of humor. Mrs. Fox is voiced by the soothing vocal strains of Meryl Streep, and that’s a pretty good cast pedigree right there. Throw into the mix the likes of Anderson mainstays Jason Schwartzman, Bill Murray and Owen Wilson, as well as Michael Gambon as an evil farmer. The stop-motion animation work is terrific, making this one of the year’s better-looking films.