Not only is director Gore Verbinski's (Pirates of the Carribean trilogy, The Ring) first animated feature "Rango" a sensual pleasure of the highest order, it's a truly original surrealist-western adventure with pitch-perfect voice acting and brilliant thematic invention.
Johnny Depp voices the titular character; at first a nameless, identity deprived Chameleon with a penchant for dramatics, who through a set of extremely odd circumstances and well crafted tales of grandeur, ends up as the Sheriff in the town of "Dirt", a water-deprived, grungy, bizarre place inhabited by equally bizarre anthropomorphized Western film archetypes.
Depp, leading an (unexpectedly) brilliant voice cast including Isla Fisher, Harry Dean Stanton and Ray Winstone, is virtually unrecognizable here. Totally throwing himself into this role despite this being an animated film, Depp creates an entirely original voice; Rango is a three-dimensional (even though the film is not *GASP* presented in 3D), memorable and oddly sympathetic character, among the many others in this film.
Perhaps the film's biggest strength is the detailed and gorgeous rendering and animation, done by George Lucas' ILM in their first animated feature. The creatures populated throughout the film's desert environment, all strange desert morphs of western archetypes, including Bill Nighy's menacing chaingun-tail-equipped Rattle Snake Jake and a huge squadron of thieving redneck-like moles, all move with a believable grace. The cinematography and lighting, advised by Coen Bros favorite Roger Deakins, creates a lush, almost photo-real look to the environments and characters, and adds to the metaphysics of the film's original-but-classic western feel.
But while on the surface, this Nickelodeon-produced film may seem geared toward imagination-inclined kids, and it is, Verbinski has actually created a subtly self-reflexive story that is best swallowed by mature filmgoers who will swoon over the myriad Western/Sergio Leone allusions. And while the intense gunplay and surrealistic fever dream sequences may frighten younger viewers, "Rango" is a fun, gorgeous, metaphysical journey through Western film history, with a thematic resonance that is at once comforting and familiar, but ultimately deeply human.
