Rango exists in a strange paradox: It’s animated, so children will naturally be interested, but it’s themed for adults with very mature references. Get a sitter or take the kids? Here’s a third option: take the sitter. They’ll appreciate Rango’s humor more than the kids. And if you do take the little ones, expect them to ask questions after the movie. Like why did the doctor put on a rubber glove and stick his finger up in the air when the other character mentioned a sore prostate? “What’s a prostate? Tell us, daddy, please.” You’ll never hear the end of it from the backseat. Tell them what it is, in all the scary details, and you’ll never get them to the pediatrician again. You don’t tell them, and next thing you know they’re Googling “finger in prostate” — young eyes can’t un-see that.
Prostates don’t belong in films for children. Is that me coddling the children of the 21st Century? Maybe, but that’s not all that’s out of place in Rango, Gore Verbinski’s ode to westerns: swearin’, murderin’, tobaccy, cee-gars, references to other western films and the water-infused plot, which draws so heavily from Roman Polanski’s Chinatown that Robert Towne deserves a screenwriting credit. Adults will be amused; their children might be missing half the jokes.
Rango begins with an aquarium-based chameleon who fancies himself a master thespian. During a move, the little lizard (voiced with whimsy by Johnny Depp) is bumped from his aquarium and tossed into the Mojave Desert, where the local wildlife acts like they’re stars on an episode of Deadwood. The lizard adopts the name Rango — short for Durango, the name on a food label — and struts into town looking for water, the currency of the desert. He meets all kinds of grizzled beasts — bearded mice, spectacled tarantulas, wrinkly chickens, toothless horny toads — who fulfill all the western roles: shopkeeper, bartender, gunslinger, town drunk and bandits. A mariachi band of burrowing owls act as the film’s Greek chorus.
The character design and animation are terrific. The film has a one-of-a-kind look to it; the style is a mixture of photo-realistic textures with oddball animal caricatures. It's not as cartoony and vibrant as a Pixar; the animation is dirty and dusty like the Old West. The characters are harshly lit under the Nevada sun, creating dense shadows under hat brims and overexposed vistas over their shoulders. Indoors, the shadows dance around sunlight that falls through the windows and those swinging saloon doors. The look of Rango is that of a real western, which adds an authentic pop.
As Rango stumbles around town a mystery begins to unfold: a greedy turtle serving as the mayor — suspenders holding his shell up — may be hording the town’s water in some kind of nefarious plot to hike up the water rates. Rango takes out a posse (on riding roadrunners) to investigate, which results in double-crosses, a rattlesnake showdown, a chase with a covered wagon and a sequence with moles riding bats like they’re the air cavalry.
The voice casting is fun, though I tire tremendously of Johnny Depp doing Johnny Depp impersonations. Isla Fisher does a remarkable western shtick, as does Harry Dean Stanton and Alfred Molina. Clint Eastwood’s Man With No Name makes a cameo, though he’s voiced by Timothy Olyphant doing a noteworthy Eastwood impression. If Slim Pickens were alive, he would have found himself right at home with all the crusty western talk. I really enjoyed Fisher's character, called Beans, who delivers a rapid-fire bumpkin speak: "Git yer fee-langes offa dem dare bottles."
I especially enjoyed the placement of music and sound effects throughout the film. “Ave Maria” as Rango falls from his aquarium is clever. A mariachi-tinted version of the Raising Arizona soundtrack (the song with the yodeling) plays during an enthusiastic hawk chase. “Ride of the Valkyries,” a parody of a similar scene in Apocalypse Now, plays during the bat air-assault. It’s overused in aerial sequences, but Wagner’s famous song somehow never gets old. And if you listen real carefully you’ll hear that famous windmill squeak from the opening of Once Upon a Time in the West.
I enjoyed most of Rango, especially its western look, but it ran out of things to do just after the halfway mark. And it didn’t balance the humor through the entire film. Was it for adults or children? I’m still confused. A Pixar film would aim between the two, but Rango’s aim was a little high. Not that all films have to be Pixar films; it's just that Pixar has mastered its audience. Rango not sure who its audience is.
