For one, I think the character designs are amazing. I want to shake the hand of whoever designed the characters for this movie. Rango is a chameleon, a family pet who is stuck in the middle of the dessert. He comes across a town of other animals, dessert animals, and he obviously does not fit in, what with his colors and attitude. I wonder how different/similar is costume vs character design? Or are they tied together? Because for someone to design all these townsfolk/animals with a unified, old-wild-west concept is pretty neat. It's as if Rango is from the future, of sorts, and is thrown back into this time period of gun slingers and cowboys and outlaws. My favorite character is definitely Rattlesnake Jake. How do you give an outlaw animal, that has no arms, a gun? Put it on his tail in place of the rattler. Genius. Also: Owl-Mariachi Band. Epic.
I loved the voice acting. Besides Johnny Depp, as everyone is pretty aware of his uncanny ability to just morph into any character thrown at him, the other cast members are great as well. I mentioned Rattlesnake Jake, who was voiced by Bill Nighy. I'm not too familiar with him, but he plays Davy Jones in the Pirates of the Caribbean series, Minister Rufus Scrimgeour in Harry Potter, and Quentin on Pirate Radio. More of the supporting-actor type, it seems. But hey, just from hearing him in Rango makes me want to see more of this guy. And Ned Beatty, who voices the Mayor, is also the voice of Lotso from Toy Story 3! No wonder I knew the guy sounded familiar. I think it was interesting how Abigail Breslin seemed to be advertised semi-heavily for the movie behind Depp, considering her character didn't even seem that important, but that's Hollywood for ya.
When Rango makes his first appearance in the movie, I was bit surprised by all the detail put into his character. Later, this detail appears in all the characters. It's like...super-realism-animation? I don't know, it was pretty bizarre, but very cool. Even though Timothy Olyphant (TV series Justified) voices the Spirit of the West, I immediately jumped to Clint Eastwood when I saw the character on screen. Maybe they modeled the character after Eastwood? And I SWEAR there's a Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas reference in this movie. It happens near the beginning as Rango is perilously dodging highway vehicles, he lands on a convertible which holds characters that seem like they're from FLLV! What! I tried googling it, but information is scarce. I've never actually seen FLLV but I recognize that characters, and damnit all, I think those characters made an extremely brief cameo in Rango. Wut?
And lastly, the music score. WOW, do I love the music in this film. Mariachi songs, Wild West chase themes, and then, Ride of the Valkyries a la bluegrass? Hans Zimmer, you musically-genius-bastard, you.
This film is definitely worth a look.
"Stay in school, eat your veggies, and burn all books that ain't Shakespeare."
~Rango
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