With the release of the French version of Fantastic Mr. Fox a mere two weeks away, we thought we’d share the poster for the for dubbed version. Click on the image below to view it full size.

via IMPAwards

This morning it was announced that Fantastic Mr. Fox received two Academy Award nominations, one for Best Animated Feature and another for Best Original Score. This is the second nomination Wes has received, after receiving a Best Original Screenplay nomination with Owen Wilson in 2002. But what are Fantastic Mr. Fox’s chances come Oscar time? We’ll take a look at that and get Wes’ reaction to the nominations after the break.

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It’s official:

Animated Film:
Coraline
Fantastic Mr. Fox
The Princess and the Frog
The Secret of Kells
Up

I have seen 1, 2 and 5 – excellent competition. Good luck, Wes!

Also:

Best Score
Avatar
Fantastic Mr. Fox
The Hurt Locker
Sherlock Holmes
Up

via Vulture

An interesting article today from The A.V. Club on the philosophies of some of Bill Murray’s most famous characters, including Herman Blume from Rushmore.

The asceticism of Scrooged and Rushmore
As practiced by certain sects of Hinduism, Jainists, and even Christians who reject the ideas of “prosperity theology” (and actually, you know, listen to Jesus), asceticism involves a conscious abstaining from worldly pleasures in favor of focusing on one’s spiritual life. While he doesn’t end up wandering the desert in sackcloth eating only what may fall into his bowl, Murray does arrive at these basic tenets of asceticism in two of his most popular roles: In Scrooged, Murray’s Frank Cross is dedicated to success no matter the cost to his basic humanity, until a night of being tormented by spirits—who are really just manifestations of his own conscience—opens his eyes to the simpler joys of “putting a little love in your heart” and helping your fellow man. In Rushmore, Murray’s Herman Blume is a self-made tycoon with his own multimillion-dollar business and the lifestyle to match, yet he’s crippled by ennui, and despairing over the alienation he feels toward his family. Pursuit of a truer definition of love eventually tears his world apart—and wrecks him both financially and physically—but by movie’s end, Blume has undergone a total spiritual reawakening, and seems to have found happiness at last in his total unburdening.

Read the full article at The A.V. Club.

From Richard Brody’s blog at the New Yorker:

I remembered this passage from the F. Scott Fitzgerald story “The Freshest Boy”:

He had contributed to the events by which another boy was saved from the army of the bitter, the selfish, the neurasthenic and the unhappy. It isn’t given to us to know those rare moments when people are wide open and the lightest touch can wither or heal. A moment too late and we can never reach them any more in this world. They will not be cured by our most efficacious drugs or slain with our sharpest swords.

—and it occurred to me that more than everything else—more than all the things in his stories that I have been inspired by and imitated and stolen to the best of my abilities—THIS describes my experience of the works of J. D. Salinger.

The first below (click to enlarge), the second after the jump.

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DVD Active has just posted the release information and revised cover art for Fantastic Mr. Fox on DVD and Blu-Ray. The release date is now March 23.

Full information and Blu-Ray art afer the jump.

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Here’s Wes’ acceptance speech as Weasel from Fantastic Mr. Fox at the recent National Board of Review awards ceremony. It is awesome.

After you watch the high quality version above, you can watch a video from the event embedded after the jump to see how it played in the room.

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Last night Wes accepted the Best Animated Film award for Fantastic Mr. Fox from the New York Film Critics Circle, video of George Clooney’s introduction and Wes’ speech below.

 
If the video goes down, here are two reports on the evening from The New York Times.

The Golden Tomato Awards were announced at Rotten Tomatoes today, and the third best reviewed wide release in the U.S. is none other than Fantastic Mr. Fox. The film is just barely behind the hits Star Trek and Up. Hopefully this will encourage people to see the film. Read the full list of winner at Rotten Tomatoes.