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Fantastic Mr. Fox

FILM · 2009 · USA

Fantastic Mr. Fox

28 archived facts 4 topics 1 source Last reviewed Oct 2026

  • Fantastic Mr. Fox — production image

28 Interesting Facts About Fantastic Mr. Fox

Interesting Facts (24)

  1. #001

    Writer, producer and director Wes Anderson preferred to record the actors' dialogue on location outside the studio to increase naturalness: "We went out into the woods, we went up to the attic, we went to the barn, we went underground for some things. So there was a great deal of spontaneity in the recordings."

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  2. #002

    The film's color scheme is primarily autumnal (yellow, orange and brown), with almost no green or blue. Kristofferson's (Eric Chase Anderson's) blue wardrobe, however, was deliberate, as it emphasizes that he is a visiting outsider.

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  3. #003

    CGI was used in only one scene, the flooding of the flint mine.

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  4. #004

    As Mr. Fox (George Clooney) and Kylie (Wallace Wolodarsky) review the plans for the first heist in Fox's study, Fox sits in a large armchair with a board on the armrest that he uses as a desk for his microphone. Roald Dahl also wrote his stories exactly this way, based on old photographs.

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  5. #005

    Rat's (Willem Dafoe's) death was nearly reshot because the MPAA felt it showed a rat dying of blood loss and Mr. Fox (George Clooney) giving him his own blood to drink. It was in fact a puddle made up of the remnants of the cider flood, in which people try to drive animals out of their underground burrows.

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  6. #006

    The original story was written during a dark period of Roald Dahl's life. He had already lost one of his five children to measles and had witnessed another develop water on the brain after a traffic accident. It was only natural that he was encouraged to write a story portraying the father as the family's protector.

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  7. #007

    Ash's (Jason Schwartzman's) ear twitch was based on a gesture most foxes (and domestic canids) make to show aggression and/or displeasure.

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  8. #008

    A total of 535 puppets were made for the film. Mr. Fox alone had seventeen different styles, and each of Mr. Fox's styles had to be made in six different sizes. He has only 102 puppets.

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  9. #009

    It was shot digitally using the Nikon D3, which offers a resolution significantly higher than even full high definition. It was also shot at a frame rate of twelve frames per second rather than the smoother twenty-four, so that viewers could notice the stop-motion medium itself.

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  10. #010

    Writer, producer and director Wes Anderson wanted to use real animal fur for all the animal puppets, even though this meant the hair ripples unnaturally in the film because the animators hold the models between frames. This rippling appears to have been intentional.

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  11. #011

    The film's look was inspired by the village of Great Missenden in Buckinghamshire, England, where Roald Dahl lived and worked. The tree the Fox family lives in is based on a prominent beech tree on Dahl's property, and Mr. Fox's study recreates in meticulous detail the interior of the famous garden shed where Dahl wrote most of his work.

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  12. #012

    Perfecting the first Mr. Fox puppet took seven months.

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  13. #013

    Kristofferson's (Eric Chase Anderson's) unaccompanied child badge reads: "Name: Kristofferson Silverfox. Height: 42 cm (tall for a pup). Weight: 3.5 kg. Allergies: None. Reason for travel: My father is ill."

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  14. #014

    Writer, producer and director Wes Anderson used Saran Wrap for moving water and cotton balls for smoke.

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  15. #015

    In the original book, humans and animals never interacted directly with each other, so it was never clear whether they could understand one another. Here, when Mr. Fox (George Clooney) asks Franklin Bean (Sir Michael Gambon) whether he has brought the child, Bean answers and clearly understands him.

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  16. #016

    In the closing scene at the supermarket, everyone except Ash, who is drinking grape juice, drinks Bean's apple juice boxes. This is another way in which Ash is "different".

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  17. #017

    Mrs. Felicity Fox (Meryl Streep) takes her name from Roald Dahl's widow.

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  18. #018

    The hair on the human characters was real human hair collected from the studio employees of Mackinnon & Saunders, the company that produced the film's puppets.

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  19. #019

    This is the first Wes Anderson film that does not include one of his signature slow-motion scenes.

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  20. #020

    20th Century Fox considered making Mr. Fox the company's mascot, but decided against it because the idea was too similar to a joke once made on The Simpsons (1989).

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  21. #021

    According to animation director Henry Selick, while in Paris Wes Anderson would act out scenes and send them to the animators via iPhone.

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  22. #022

    When Mr. Fox is frightened he bares his teeth, which matches the instinctive behavior of a real fox.

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  23. #023

    While Ash (Jason Schwartzman) and Mr. Fox (George Clooney) talk in the sewer, Ash was still seated and staring at the viewer. This is generally known as the "Kubrick stare", a technique developed by Stanley Kubrick, who usually used it when a character was meant to be frightening or unsettling.

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  24. #024

    Mr. Fox's wardrobe consisted of Wes Anderson's own brown corduroy suits.

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Behind the Scenes (1)

  1. #025

    In the months before the film's release, controversy arose over writer, producer and director Wes Anderson spending very little time on set and choosing to direct the animation by email from his apartment in Paris. In an article published in the Los Angeles Times in October 2009, cinematographer Tristan Oliver was quoted as saying: "He's got a bit of O.C.D. Contact with people disturbs him. This way, he can spend an entire day locked in an empty room with a computer. He's a bit like The Wizard of Oz (1939). Behind the curtain." Informed of Oliver's discontent, Anderson said, "I would say that what the cinematographer has to say behind the scenes goes beyond the limit. The director went back to working on the film. So I don't even want to respond." On the Wes Anderson fan website "Rushmore Academy" (named after Anderson's Rushmore (1998)), Oliver criticized the article for portraying him as the villain: "Yes, working with Wes can be frustrating, but that's true of every director, and I've worked with hundreds of people more frustrating and less motivated than Wes. Let's keep resting the ghost of this myth, and oh, the death threats should stop too. Thanks."

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Easter Eggs & References (2)

  1. #026

    The train sometimes seen passing in the background is the same train in Ash's (Jason Schwartzman's) bedroom. Its scale was changed using the forced perspective film technique.

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  2. #027

    While Ash (Jason Schwartzman) talks with Agnes (Juman Malouf) on the Whackbat field, a plane flies in the background announcing the grand opening of the Boggis, Bunce and Bean Supermarket, and we see them again later near the end of the film.

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Deeper Meaning (1)

  1. #028

    The source material accounts for roughly one hour of the total running time before it gives way to a tangent of Wes Anderson's own story, made up of his own ideas.

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Related pages

  • The Bad Guys — Fantastic Mr. Fox comes up in the facts on that page

Sources & editorial notes

Reference databases

  • IMDb IMDb title page (trivia)

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