Even though The Legionnaire has produced hundreds of reviews, this particular one is very special to me because it will be my 100th contribution. To celebrate this personal milestone, I wanted to take a look at a movie that is near and dear to my heart and share my thoughts about it on The Legionnaire. Going through the catalog of reviews that the site has produced, I noticed one film that The Legionnaire hasn’t covered yet is the Oscar winning animated film Rango (2011).

Directed by Gore Verbinski (best known for directing the first three Pirates of the Caribbean films), Rango is an animated film that I was looking forward to ever since I saw the teaser back in 2010. As you could properly tell, my anticipation was met to the highest degree. One of the draws for me was the animation itself. If you’ve seen the movie or just previews of it, then you know what I mean. From what I learned, the visual effects company Industrial Lights and Magic (a Lucasfilm studio) did the animation, which was something that made me appreciate the film even more. However, we all know that great visuals for any movie don’t automatically make a great movie. If that were the case, then a majority of Transformers and/or super hero films would be cinematic masterpieces, and we know that isn’t the case. So, let me dive into why I love this animated masterpiece even more, with some mild spoilers.  

In Rango, we start off with a lizard (voiced by Johnny Depp; not known as Rango yet), a protagonist who has an identity crisis stuck in his own world, aka a terrarium in the back of a car with a family on the road in the Mojave Desert. He also has a bit of a theater performer complex and sees his life as a story, but with little plot/purpose. This is until his owners swerve their vehicle and unintentionally run over an armadillo, which sends the lizard and his terrarium flying out of the car. It shatters on the hot asphalt, which leaves him stranded in the desert. After the protagonist pulls himself together, he discovers the armadillo (voiced by Alfred Molina who goes by the name Roadkill according to IMDb) is still alive, but he needs help getting up after being run over. He then tells our protagonist that he was crossing the road to see the Spirit of the West, who was calling for him. Unimpressed, our protagonist informs the armadillo that he needs water or else he won’t survive. His new friends inform him that in order to find water, he needs to find a town called Dirt, which is in the opposite direction of where the armadillo is going. With no other choice, our protagonist heads away from the busy road and towards the desert where he can hopefully find the town of Dirt. His journey, however, is not an easy one as not only is he traveling with no water, but he has to deal with the harsh sun and a hawk who sees our him as his next meal. At night, our protagonist finds refuge in a sewer pipe, and after having abstract dreams about his journey so far, he is awakened by a flow of water which pushes him out of the pipe. As he starts trying to collect the water to consume, he finds himself at the other end of a shotgun barrel by a desert iguana named Beans (voiced by Isla Fisher). Beans owns a ranch that was owned by her late father that is slowly becoming unfit to grow any crops due to the lack of water the surrounding area has been getting. She grows suspicious that something is afoot with how the water has not been turning up after she sees our protagonist almost drowned after being dumped in the desert. After he gives his life summary, Beans concludes that he’s pretty much an innocent bystander and offers him a ride into Dirt. When he gets there, our protagonist tries to get some water at a local saloon, which he unfortunately gets denied as the whole town is facing a water crisis. After a local patron in the saloon starts questioning him because he sticks out like a sore thumb, our protagonist realizes that he could fabricate a new persona since he is in a new environment. He comes up with a backstory where as a tough grifter and comes up with the name Rango. While he impresses the townsfolk, Rango unintentionally causes trouble with a Gila monster named Bad Bill (voiced by Ray Winstone), which results in the two them having a duel in the center of town. While Rango tries to come up with the courage to face Bad Bill, he notices him running away, which both surprises and relives Rango. This gives Rango a bit of confidence boost. However, unbeknown to him, Bad Bill ran away because the Hawk that gave Rango trouble earlier interrupts the duel. Once Rango realizes the Hawk’s presence, he goes into full panic mode. After the Hawk chases him throughout town, Rango accidentally knocks over an empty water tower, which then kills the hawk. This causes the townsfolk to celebrate, resulting in Rango meeting the Mayor of Dirt, who is a desert tortoise (voiced by Ned Beatty). The mayor appoints Rango as sheriff as he gives people hope, which is something the town needs after its struggles. Now a sheriff of the town of Dirt, Rango is demanded by Beans to investigate the water crisis the town has been dealing with as the only water source in town is in the local bank. However, as soon as the townsfolk start panicking when the supply of water is low, Rango intervenes and promises to do anything to fix the situation. His word doesn’t hold up well as he inadvertently helps a family of moles, two brothers Jedidiah and Ezekiel (both voiced by Ryan Hurst), and their father Balthazar (voiced by Harry Dean Stanton), rob the bank at night. With the water supply gone, Rango then forms a posse, which also includes Beans, and heads towards the desert, looking for clues on where the missing moisture might be.      

Aside for the visuals, there are three major elements that I love about Rango, and still do this after watching it countless times since 2011. First, there’s the western feel that’s put to great use in an animated film. Second, there’s the PG rating. Finally, there’s the overall messages of the film, which stood out after rewatching through a fresh Catholic perspective.

Westerns, for the most part, are somewhat of a dying breed when it comes to movie genres. We’ll see a few here or there in a given year though not to the same degree as, for example, comic book films. Thus, seeing an animated film like Rango pull off a fantastic western was immensely satisfying. I think what helps make this a great western, along with the visuals, was the cinematography, done by modern day Hollywood legend Roger Deakins. For those who aren’t aware, Deakins has worked on good number of well-known films such as The Shawshank Redemption (1994), Fargo (1996), The Big Lebowski (1998), O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), A Beautiful Mind (2001), No Country for Old Men (2007), Doubt (2008), and True Grit (2010), just to name a few. His cinematography, plus the visual effects inserted in this western, make this one of the most beautiful films that I have ever seen that has not been made by Disney. The only other films that I can think of that rivals Rango for the scenery are the animated Spider-Man films, which is an ongoing debate in my head.

One element that I especially appreciate that most people don’t think about is how gritty and edgy Rango is, and doing so without having modern pop culture humor and contemporary music. This has been a problem with most animated films as of late as most big budgeted animated films have the traits that I mentioned earlier but with none of the bite that Rango has.  

Ever since the PG rating in CGI (computer generated imagery) animated films became more mainstream thanks to movies like Shrek (2001) and Shark Tale (2004), which unintentionally started the trend, I felt that the PG rating has been pacified to a state where they’re basically G rated movies but have a little edge to them. This trend has irked me for some time because this shows that animation studios are not risktakers when it comes to making a well-crafted and sophisticated narratives, but rather films with humor as the driving point and a few jokes that would make it rude enough for it to be classified as a G rated film. This typically caters to a younger audience, which was a safe bet for animation studios because it was an easy way to make their money back. As someone who loves animation, I felt like the only animation studio that I could rely on was Pixar, which made quality films that made use of the PG rating. Then came Rango, which is not only a quality looking film, but it’s PG that earns its rating.

According to the Motion Picture Rating (commonly known as the MPAA), Rango is rated PG for rude humor, smoking, action, and language and, let’s just say, it doesn’t use those labels lightly. Throughout the film, there are characters that will smoke, curse, and use violence most commonly seen in old westerns but not to the degree like a Quintin Tarantino film, such as Django Unchained (2012). Normally, elements such as these would be too much for children and maybe concerning for parents, but for me, it was presented in a manner that I enjoyed highly that didn’t feel gimmicky or presented just for shock value. It is truly a gritty film. There’s one scene where a villain who goes by the name Rattle-Snake Jake (Voiced by Bill Nighy) threatens Beans by constricting her and saying “sign the damn paper women!” to which she replies “go to hell” followed by him responding “where do you think I come from?” This scene, in particular, has always stood out to me because it shows how much of a threat villains can be in animated films and also how to properly execute the use of swearing in these types of films instead of using those words for humor like the word “ass” in the Shrek films whenever the title character is referring to the character of Donkey. 

The reason why this is important to me is because I grew up on animation ranging from Looney Tunes from the mid-20^th century to animated films and shows from the 1980s-1990s. Animators back then were risktakers in not only storytelling, but also pushing the boundaries of humor that didn’t get major backlash from certain individuals. To me, this tone shifted when CGI became more focused on pushing juvenile humor with little to no edge during the 2000s as they didn’t want to potentially scare away inventors when producing a multi-million-dollar films. As I mentioned earlier, this trend irked me, but Rango was that oasis in the desert of mediocre animated offerings and quenched my thirst for a good quality CGI film that wasn’t Pixar.

So, one full disclosure that I do have to make here in this review is that I did not go into Rango with a full Catholic perspective when I first watched it. I was a practicing Catholic back in 2011 when I first saw it, but I was not fully entrenched in my faith to the degree I am now. That being said, after rewatching a good chunk of the film recently, I was able to pick up some Catholic elements this time around. One is the epiphany that Rango has when he meets The Spirt of the West (a human character voiced by Timothy Olyphant). During the end of the second act, Rango is exposed as a fraud by Rattle-Snake Jake and is forced out of town, which leads Rango to walk continuously in the desert to where he finds himself on the other side of the road where he first met the Armadillo. When Rango meets the Spirit of the West, he tells him he’s unsure who he is. The Spirit then tells him that the deeds make the man. Rango then feels unsettled by these words because his deeds failed the people of Dirt. He feels that they need a hero, to which the Spirit responds to Rango to be that hero. He tells Rango that it is not about him but rather the people of Dirt, and concludes that no man can walk out on their own story. This speaks to me a lot as a Catholic because we sometimes have selfish needs and forget about others when they are needed. This also reminds me that the Lord will put ourselves in situations we need to give our assistance, though we may not be aware of it. This has happened to me a good a number of times. The townspeople needed a hero and, reluctantly, Rango answered the call. Finally, when the Spirit said that no man can walk out on his own story. This reminds me that no matter how far we run from God, He will place us back on track eventually, whether it’s in the form of an individual or coming back to God himself. Either way, the themes near the third act set the tone for the climax of the, film which lead to Rango being the hero he was meant to be.

So, if animated, talking animal films, especiallyone with a protagonist that’s slightly annoying, is something that you don’t find joy in, then Rango may not be the film for you. I, on the other hand, love it with all my heart. I consider it not only one of my favorite animated films, but one of my favorite films, period. It is definitely in my top ten. The worst part about this film is that it makes other animated films pale by comparison, though we have had some great ones as of late such as Soul (2020), Puss in Boots: The Last Wish (2022), and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, which is currently my favorite 2023 film as of this review. Ironically, I actually don’t want a sequel to Rango as it is a perfect, self-contained movie that doesn’t need to continue the story. However, I do hope that we will see another animated film by director Gore Verbinski, and done in the same fashion. Hopefully, it could be just as good as Rango, maybe even better.