Rango

Directed by Gore Verbinski

(PG)

***

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Rango “rewrites the animation playbook,” said Betsy Sharkey in the Los Angeles Times. A “time-bending, mind-bending, just-go-with-it fable,” this first animated feature from the team behind the visual inventions of the Pirates of the Caribbean series manages to blend an old-time Western with very contemporary concerns and still be “genuinely funny.” The hero of the story is a pet chameleon—charmingly voiced by Johnny Depp—who accidentally lands the job of sheriff in a lawless town that’s desperately short on water. The “more movies you’ve seen,” the more you’ll like this one, said Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times. “Rango loves Westerns,” and loves cinema history enough to mix references to Apocalypse Now with its hat tips to Blazing Saddles. But even a kid who’s seen few old films will be drawn into this “smart,” involving tale. Then maybe I’ve seen too many Westerns, said Tasha Robinson in the A.V. Club. The plot here felt so predictable that I had to look past it to enjoy Rango’s off-kilter visuals and “anarchic sensibility.” If only the “joyously weird experience” of Rango’s surface attractions went right to the film’s core.