Isle of Dogs (2018)
- Despite a rocky opening weekend, Isle of Dogs went on to gross over 5x its budget thanks purely to incredible audience word-of-mouth.
- During the filming of Isle of Dogs, the director famously rewrote the ending on the fly after seeing the chemistry between the lead actors.
Isle of Dogs is a 2018 American stop-motion animated comedy-drama directed by Wes Anderson. Set in a dystopian near-future Japan, the film depicts the fictional city of Megasaki, where all dogs have been quarantined to a vast trash island due to a canine flu outbreak. When 12-year-old Atari Kobayashi flies to the island to find his guard dog Spots, he is aided by a pack of five exiled dogs โ led by Chief, voiced by Bryan Cranston, a stray who has never trusted humans โ in a journey across the island's treacherous landscape of compacted garbage, abandoned amusement parks, and toxic waste.
Wes Anderson's stop-motion animation was painstakingly crafted over two years at 3 Mills Studios in London, with every set, puppet, and movement designed with his characteristic precision. The film's treatment of Japanese culture sparked debate about cultural appropriation, though Anderson's evident love for Japanese cinema, particularly Akira Kurosawa's work, was apparent throughout. Isle of Dogs earned $64 million worldwide on a $35 million budget.
