Trivia / Isle of Dogs

• All-Star Cast:
  • The film boasts a huge cast, including Bryan Cranston, Edward Norton, Bill Murray, Jeff Goldblum, Scarlett Johansson, Frances McDormand, Liev Schreiber, Greta Gerwig, Tilda Swinton, F. Murray Abraham and Harvey Keitel.
  • The Japanese dub of the film is not behind in this either, featuring very well-known voice actors like Taiten Kusunoki, Aya Endo, Takaya Hashi, Toshiyuki Morikawa, Nobunaga Shimazaki, etc.
• Children Voicing Children: Downplayed, but since all barks have been rendered in English in the movie, Spots' newborn puppies use clips of actual baby coos and cries.
• Contest Winner Cameo: Wes Anderson hosted a competition for someone to be a member of the voice cast for this film. The only requirement was that they donated ten dollars or more to the Film Foundation, a non-profit founded by Martin Scorsese, which specializes in the preservation and restoration of film around the world.
• The Danza: Assistant Scientist Yoko Ono is played by... Yoko Ono.
• Deleted Role: Bud Cort did a voice role for a scene that was cut out of the final film. It is rumored that he was going to be the voice of the leader of Gondo's dog tribe and showed his death on screen that would pay tribute to one of Wes Anderson's favorite films, Harold and Maude.
• Directed by Cast Member: In the Latin American Spanish dub, José Antonio Macías was the ADR Director and Scrap's voice actor.
• Follow the Leader: It was part of the wave of PG-13 and R-rated animated movies announced by studios after the success of Sausage Party. This film even includes Edward Norton, who was in said film! That said, the films couldn't be more different if they tried.
• Inspiration for the Work: Wes Anderson has said that he was inspired by seeing a road sign for the Isle of Dogs in England while Fantastic Mr. Fox was in development. Anderson said that the film was strongly influenced by the films of Akira Kurosawa, as well as the stop-motion animated holiday specials made by Rankin/Bass Productions.
• Irony as She Is Cast: Edward Norton, a fluent Japanese speaker, doesn't speak a lick of said language throughout the film.
• Meaningful Release Date: Might be unintentional, but according to Chinese horoscope, 2018, the year this film was released in, is the year of the dog.
• Multiple Languages, Same Voice Actor:
  • As normally is done in Japan, almost all the characters played by Japanese actors are dubbed back in Japan, with two notorious exceptions: Hiroshi, played by Nishiro Murakami, is voiced by Nobunaga Shimazaki in the Japanese dub and Yoko Ono is dubbed by Rie Ishizuka, despite Ono being able to speak Japanese herself.^note Very likely because Yoko Ono has spent almost her entire life in the U.K. and maybe the people behind the dub thought her Japanese would sound with a thick British accent.
  • Greta Gerwig voices Tracy in the English and French versions of the film.
• No Dub for You: In Latin America, albeit only for its theatrical release. The video release did include a dub.
• Sleeper Hit: Many people expected that this movie would bomb the way Anderson's previous animated outing, Fantastic Mr. Fox did. It ended up earning nearly $64 million on an estimated $30 million budget.
• What Could Have Been: In the Latin American Spanish dub, Mayor Kobayashi was originally planned to be dubbed, but his Spanish dialogue was removed from the final dub by the producers' request, despite his original voice actor (Humberto Solórzano) is still credited in the dub cast list. In fact, almost all the Japanese dialogue is kept in the dub, excluding some parts from Atari.

---