Analysis of Wes Anderson’s Isle of Dogs; A Fictional World Amid Cultural References and the Crisis of Reality

Wes Anderson’s Isle of Dogs is a stop-motion work set in a fictional near-future Japan, where Mayor Megasaki, due to the outbreak of “Dog Flu,” exiles all dogs to a garbage-dump island. The film is a blend of visual beauty, dry humor, and cultural references, which has sparked both praise and criticism.

The story centers on Atari, a teenage boy who travels to the dog exile island in search of his dog, Spots. There, he encounters a group of exiled dogs, each with its own unique personality.

Aesthetic Elements in Isle of Dogs

The film constructs a detailed and imaginative world through set designs enriched with references to classic Japanese cinema, such as the works of Kurosawa and Honda. Its visual form—combining puppet animation with minimalist color schemes—is interwoven with an artistic reflection on Japanese cultural traditions.


Beatrice Fiorentino’s View on Isle of Dogs

Italian critic Beatrice Fiorentino, in her analysis, brings forth two key points that stand out among discussions about the use of references in Anderson’s film:

1. The references in these films are not imitations, but acts of homage.

A clear example of this can be seen in the films submitted to the Cannes Film Festival, including Leos Carax’s latest film It’s Not Me. Thus, for every reference, two possibilities may occur for the filmmaker:
a. A reference that is merely imitated by the director.
b. A reference that is purely an homage by the director.
Of course, the artist’s intentions can be multiple and extend beyond these two, but strangely, directors in their later works tend to lean toward homage rather than imitation.
When we speak of homage, we imply that the filmmaker has previously drawn inspiration from these films. Hence, one can say that in the early stages of filmmaking, imitation prevails, and in the later stages, it becomes homage.

Fiorentino continues by pointing to Anderson’s ultimate aim in using these references:

2. “Anderson borrows these references to build a recognizable world, but his goal lies beyond that—elevating the story to a universal level, by blending the concreteness of reality with the imaginative freedom—playful and clever—of fantasy.”

Although this is an accurate interpretation of Wes Anderson’s film, the mechanism behind it seems to require a deeper look:

A reference points to something external, like the word “table” referring to a physical object. Thus, a reference is world-constructing. However, a story creates a world that is inherently unstable, because according to the epistemology of storytelling, this world is born of imagination and has no real existence. This leads to a paradox. Solving this paradox, like all contradictions, can take two routes:

1. The paradox destroys itself.
2. The paradox leans toward a utopia.

It can be said that Wes Anderson’s film, due to the micro-visual richness it creates, strives to exist in a utopian non-place.