LAHORE – ‘Rango’ may be the latest entry in an exceedingly long line of animated flicks featuring anthropomorphized animals, but it’s anything but ordinary. The long-gestating brainchild of Gore Verbinski, director of the ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ films, and the first animated feature from Industrial Light & Magic, George Lucas’ visual effects firm, ‘Rango’ staunchly defies many of the conventions of current mass-marketed cartoon fare.
It’s not in 3D; it’s a family film that borrows heavily from such adult works as ‘Chinatown’ and the post-modern westerns of ‘Peckinpah’ and ‘Leone’; its oddball comic sensibility includes references to prostate exams and ‘Fear’ and ‘Loathing in Las Vegas,’ as well as the more tried-and-true potty humor; and its cast of unsightly critters isn’t likely to inspire any bestselling children’s costumes come Halloween. It’s an unusual strategy, but it works: ‘Rango’ makes for a delightfully strange, if somewhat inconsistent, experience.
Much of the inspiration for Rango’s skewed spirit comes from its famously skewed star, Johnny Depp, who voices the title character, a domesticated chameleon cast by fate into the desert to find his true identity. He eventually lands in Dirt, a decrepit frontier town that’s literally dying of thirst. The townsfolk of Dirt desperately need a hero, and Rango, a wannabe stage actor, ingratiates himself with them by bluffing his way into a job as town sheriff. But Rango is something of a coward at heart, and when a real threat emerges in the form of a terrifying outlaw named Rattlesnake Jake (Bill Nighy), his lifelong habit of hiding behind false identities and just “blending in” is suddenly and devastatingly exposed.
The film’s narrative is a bit jagged, structured loosely around a mystery involving the sudden disappearance of Dirt’s water supply and the shady machinations of the town’s corrupt mayor, voiced by Ned Beatty.
An overabundance of characters makes matters confusing at times, and some of the action set pieces, including a sprawling chase scene set to Wagner’s ‘Flight of the Valkyries’ (a la Apocalypse Now) are breathtaking to watch but do little to advance the storyline. The jaw-droppingly vivid animation is magnificently evocative of the frontier towns of the classic westerns: its dusty, distressed aesthetic, dominated by brown and beige hues, will make you feel grimy – and not a little bit parched. Verbinski does tremendous work with atmospherics in Rango, manipulating space and light and shadow to create an experience more immersive than even some of the better 3D-animated films.
