A Nickelodeon Films production, Rango won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature at the 84th Academy Awards — the first non-Disney or Pixar film to win the award since Happy Feet in 2006, and the last one until Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse won in 2018. It also won the Annie Award for Best Animated Feature, the highest honor in animated film. It's a beautifully animated movie, particularly for the outstanding character design of its desert creatures. Rango also has exceptional voice acting from its star-studded cast led by Depp and Fisher and featuring great character actors like Alfred Molina, Ray Winstone, and Harry Dean Stanton.
Additionally, the movie is packed with references to other classic Westerns and other films from yesteryear. The water crisis plot in Rango is reminiscent of Chinatown, and there are nods to The Shakiest Gun in the West, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, and Once Upon a Time in the West. There's also a funny callback to an earlier Johnny Depp movie, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, that's a joke for the adults in the audience.
Rango was directed by Gore Verbinski, who reunited with Depp after the success of the first three Pirates of the Caribbean movies. Verbinski was hoping to do something smaller and easier after those blockbusters, not realizing how time and labor-intensive animated films actually are.
It may be difficult for some viewers to enjoy Johnny Depp movies without thinking about his offscreen behavior these days, but at least in Rango, you don't have to look at him — you can just enjoy the adventures of the funny chameleon with the familiar voice.
