ISLE OF DOGS is a Feast For Your Eyes

In order to achieve his signature visual appeal, Wes Anderson oversteps into cultural appropriation

In his latest film Isle of Dogs (and yes, it’s supposed to sound like “I Love Dogs”) Wes Anderson assembles his usual cast of voice actors to tell a quirky tale of the love and loyalty between a boy and his dog. The film is created with stop-motion animation and each moment bears the signature stamp of Anderson’s visual intentionality; nothing is ever by accident in his films, and the shapes and colours of everything on screen are beautifully assembled.  Isle of Dogs is a feast for your eyes from start credits to end credits, and full to the brim with the most adorable stop-motion pups you can imagine. The voice acting is also superbly performed with a casual, conversational feel to the dialogue that you rarely get from cartoon voice-acting.

But here’s the thing: although the majority of the film takes place on a fictional island, it’s impossible not to comment on the short segments which take place in the “real world”.  The human characters speak Japanese (without subtitles), but the dogs in this film speak English. Since most people in the audience won’t understand Japanese, this is a clever way to parallel how incomprehensible humans are to their canine companions… until Anderson introduces a single English-speaking human – who just so happens to be American.

This inevitably changes the message to one where Japanese is the incomprehensible “other”, and underscores an uncomfortable problem with the film.  The hero is named “Atari”, the villain is named “Kobayashi”, and hey, then he throws in sumo wrestlers, samurai swords, and Yoko Ono.  Anderson’s version of Japan in this film feels like a list of Japanese things he liked as a kid, with no attempt at cultural authenticity or context.

Isle of Dogs features voice performances by Bryan Cranston, Bill Murray, Ed Norton, Jeff Goldblum, and is written and directed by Wes Anderson.  It’s currently playing in select theatres.