Asteroid City

 

Somewhere over the last decade, I became a fan of Wes Anderson movies. I have enjoyed them all but not all of them are great. The previous film from the director, "The French Dispatch" is the least interesting of the films for me. It's style is elegantly in line with the visual flair of Anderson, but the content just seemed a little too on the nose for me. It was a movie filled with references to language and the way that we use words was the focus of the film. It did at least have that to hold it together. "Asteroid City" does not have these kinds of ambitions. There is a singular story told through multiple levels that will keep us amused and detached simultaneously,  and for me it worked a lot more effectively because I could not detect a point or theme, i only saw an entertainment. 

Once again, if you are not willing to be presented with artifice being passed off as a story, you should skip this, but if you look at the crystal blue sky and the phony desert horizons in the opening part of the film, and they make you laugh, then you are in the right place. This film cruises on the look Anderson can achieve in the circumstances he and his cowriters have conceived. This is a film, conceived as a play, being described by a documentary about the creation of the story. Every step we take leads down a different path and sometimes, just as you are getting involved with something that is happening on screen, the camera pulls back and we see the story from a completely new perspective, although the attitude and the moods remain the same. 

The film is filled with the usual suspects. Anderson has developed a company of players that he wants to have in his movies and when you see how they fit in, you can't blame him for wanting to keep some consistency. Jeffery Wright returns for what I think is his second Anderson film, and his delivery of General Gibson's speech is perfection. I'd love to have the laminated version that all of the attendees were promised, I think I could read it everyday and still laugh out loud. Jason Schwartzman is back for his seventh film with Anderson, and he has his biggest role since being the star of "Rushmore" back in 1998. He has mastered the deadpan delivery that is a signature of  Anderson's words. Even when he is supposed to be reacting strongly to a moment with co-star Scarlett Johansson, he still manages to keep the reaction dulled down to fit with the character. Edward Norton, Bryan Cranston, Adrian Brody and Willem Dafoe all show up for repeat appearances in one of these unusual films. Tom Hanks shows up in his maiden voyage on the good ship Anderson, apparently replacing the usual presence of Bill Murray who is surprisingly not in the film. Although he is in the movie for only a couple of seconds, I really want to believe that Jeff Goldblum was in the alien costume, although it is clearly some of the animation that has been used in Anderson's two best films, "Isle of Dogs" and "The Fantastic Mr. Fox". 

I mentioned the production design early on. The black and white sequences are fine, with some effective lighting and clever use of backstage tropes. As usual though, the colorful and cinematically electric visuals in the sequences that are in color are the thing that will hypnotize you. There is a filter on some of the scenes that will make you feel like you are driving through the desert on a summer evening, cruising Route 66 in 1956. There are two or three moments with some blue shading that are subtle but make the actor's eyes pop on screen. Cinematographer Robert Yeoman has done a fantastic job of bouncing between styles, and evoking moods with the lighting of this film. Also, as usual, the production design team should be given all the awards this year for their fake sandstone towers, two lane blacktops and especially the train that opens the film. This movie is just a visual delight. 

The story dances around grief as a subject, but it also touches on authoritarianism, love, music and family. None of the subjects are really the point of the film. This is a bauble, made to look amazing, with a stack of nesting doll type storytelling that reveals one new thing after another. It is not so much emotionally engaging as it is visually and intellectually evolving. Don't get caught up in whatever plot you might pick out, just sit back and watch the circus perform. If we are going to get movies that are all about the spectacle of how they look, this is a nice alternative to the CGI worlds of James Cameron. Both can be breathtaking, but one feels warm while the other simple seems to celebrate technology.  

The Royal Tenenbaums

 

When I first saw this movie on it's original release, I have to admit that I did not quite get it. There is a vibe to Wes Anderson's film making style that I was not tuned into. The arch, dry, detached story telling left me less engaged than I thought I should be. I did not dislike the film, I was simply indifferent to it. Flash forward twenty years and I have evolved a bit when it comes to Anderson's style. I have seen more of his films, adjusted to the off kilter approach and I have embraced the absurdity of the production design with enthusiasm.

"The Royal Tenenbaums" is Anderson's most commercially successful film, but it is not my favorite. "Isle of Dogs" the stop motion animated film, was my number one film of it's release year and contains most of the mannerisms that this film has, but it adds more heart to the story, which is where I think "Tenenbaums" shoots for but only partially succeeds at. The film is not meant for us to love the characters, they are all deeply flawed and that is the joke. We do understand them a bit better by the end and we don't wish them ill, but we can also see that they are still problematic human beings. Laughing at Royal's clueless cruelty and self centered behavior was easy, seeing him as a figure of redemption is a little harder but the steps he took seem right in retrospect.

As always there is an impressive cast in a film from Anderson, and the thing that helps me re-evaluate this film more positively is the presence of my favorite actor, Gene Hackman. As the patriarch of the family, Royal is a passively malevolent figure in his children's lives. As the lead character, he is a delightful figure to watch with jaws dropped as he utters the cluelessly cruel comments about his own family. Hackman sells this narcissistic persona flawlessly. His rapid delivery of the lines may finish before we even realize how thoughtless his words are. At this stage in his career, it pleased me to note that I was not put off by those flashbacks where he is made up to look younger. Although the image is imperfect, the acting was spot on.

If I have a reservation about the film, it is that there is a scene that involves the death of an animal. It takes place off screen, and there is some acknowledgement that it is supposed to be in a humorous context. Unlike the same sort of scene in "A Fish Called Wanda", we had a bit of a connection with this dog and that makes the film a little more sensitive for us animal lovers. Maybe this is the reason we got Isle of Dogs", if that's the case than the fiction is worth it.   

The French Dispatch

No one will be surprised to discover that the latest film from Wes Anderson is odd. In fact the very definition of quirky in the dictionary uses Wes Anderson as an example to clarify for us what quirky is. The idiosyncratic film maker is back with a movie that relies less on plot than on visual storytelling. That is not to say that there is not also dialogue, because that is equally as important to the visual, but also equally less relevant to the plot. A Wes Anderson film is an immersive cinema experience, but your tolerance of odd will be in direct proportion for your  acceptance of this movie. 

Unlike his previous two films, "Isle of Dogs" and "The Grand Budapest Hotel", this film goes out of it's way to ignore plot and embrace instead the compelling nature of language and art to make us want to follow what is going on. The outcome of any of the stories being told here is superfluous to the enjoyment we are to experience from hearing and seeing them. When writing a review of a film, I am always careful to avoid spoilers, that is completely unnecessary here because the plots are mostly meaningless and they meander around the odd characters and locales without really taking us anywhere.

This film is a set of anthologies that are held together by a conceit that is appropriate for the form of stories we are seeing. We are being presented with a tribute to writers who might have been elegant in their language and story construction, but who were mostly consumed for the pleasure of the way they write rather than the importance of the subjects that they wrote about. If you are the kind of person who picks up the New Yorker, to explore unusual slants on culture, or you read Bon Appetite, for the pleasure of preparation and the challenge of imagining taste through only words, then this movie will probably reach you. With an obituary and a brief travel prelude, to set up how everything here is connected, we move to three different stories focusing on art, politics and cooking. 

The actors are all employing a deadpan, dry, style of delivery which is typical of an Anderson film. A smile would be a justification to re-shoot the scene. If an actual human emotion appears, it would undermine the atmosphere of the production and frustrate the director. He does want us to laugh, but only in regards to the absurdity of the characters of the situation, not because we are invested in anyone. We need to take pleasure in the intricate production design, or the clever Rube Goldberg physical elements. Viewers can be stimulated by the color palate or the editing or the miniatures that make up so much of the scenery, but you should not care about a single character in this story, what you should do is listen to them talk. While many of the things they say are absurd, it is the way that they say them that is amusing. Adjectives abound and sentences turn on themselves, but always with a degree of attention to grammar that draws attention to itself. You could easily enjoy just listening to the snappy dialogue, delivered in a sardonic tone, and forgo the visuals. Conversely, you could watch this film unfold with just a musical score and be equally entertained. This is a film where content is unnecessary, style is what you want. 

I can't be more direct than to say this, if you do not care for Wes Anderson style films, this may be the most obnoxious film you encounter this year, it is the most like his films of any of his films I have seen. (I think he could use that last phrase in one of his movies). You will not be won over by this film. If you like the style of his movies, well that is all that this film has going for it. I'm not sure there are many who will want to explain why the plot doesn't matter, they will be too caught up with the trees to pay any attention to the forest. 

Isle of Dogs

OK, it's only the end of March but I think I can safely say this will be on my year end list of favorite films. I dig stop motion animation, I have enjoyed more than my fair share of Wes Anderson films, and I love dogs. Going in it should be a no brainer but I had a few doubts because of the supposed allegorical references to modern issues of immigration and xenophobia. It turns out that anyone who wants to find a tenative tie to some modern political issue in a film, does not have to work that hard. People, if you are reading that much into this story, you need to cut down on your caffeine.

The Wes Anderson style is all over this film. You can hear it in the clipped remarks that the dogs make to one another. It is also full of the color palates that he so lavishly uses in all of his movies (or at least the ones I have seen). Much of the interaction has a dynamic and undercurrent to it that makes it feel as if we are hearing two conversations at once, a surface level interface and then a deeper more satirical intercourse. There are also several visual gags that are gruesome and hysterical at the same time. No one could mistake this for a movie made by someone else.

The fact that only Anderson could have produced this film is one of the reasons that I can't take any of the charges of cultural appropriation seriously. While the truth is that he is a westerner telling a story set in Japan, it only matters that it is Japanese for some historical context. The idea that a group of people could be mislead by a nefarious political leader is not uniquely Japanese. The notion of parts of a culture being banished is not Japanese either. I'm willing to give him credit for letting the human characters speak in Japanese without making it seem like subtitles are necessary for every utterance. As I have said numerous times in my classes, "you can find something to argue about in just about anything. That doesn't mean that it is problematic to most people."

The aesthetic of the film is definitely weird.  The flu that the dogs have seems to be an odd contrivance but it works for the story. The notion of "Trash Island", is not all that different than the planet that Thor ends up on in Thor Ragnorock. The fact that Jeff Goldblum is featured in both pictures must be coincidental. The island is a nicely realized habitat that our pack has to navigate to reach an objective. There are complex backgrounds but even more intricate machinery and architecture than one would imagine in a dump.

Everything else though is backdrop for the charming story of a boy separated from his dog, and the bonds that humans and animals really do need to be complete. As a dog owner, I have frequently put words in my dogs mouths. Wes Anderson does this for the whole movie and the words are both profound and amusing. My guess is that everyone here will have a favorite dog that he/she will relate to and love. "Chief", "Duke" and "Spots" are my favorites, but ultimately all the dogs are like most dogs, lovable once you get to know them.

I can't imagine the time and talent it took to create the intricate puppets that get used for the stop motion action in the film. I know computer work must also have played a part but even then, something has to be designed first and the art direction and characters in this movie are astonishing. The actors all feel as if they are carefully matched to their characters. Bryan Cranston as Chief manages to be gruff but also winsome in spots. Goldblum's Duke is a never ending fountain of understatement and set up lines, with just the right sonorous tone to make it sound somewhat intellectual. The music combines traditional Japanese flavored drums with more tuneful passages to also add to the environment that everyone in the film is occupying.

Everyone else may have noticed this, it's not a haiku but it is a homophone: "I Love Dogs  "

The Grand Budapest Hotel

I suppose everyone knows that Wes Anderson films are an acquired taste. He has directed thirteen films and I have only seen five of them. I enjoyed "Bottle Rocket" and "Rushmore", I was largely indifferent to "The Royal Tennenbaums" despite the presence of my favorite actor, Gene Hackman, and I really enjoyed "The Fantastic Mr. Fox". For some reason I have been unable to work up enough enthusiasm for "Moonrise Kingdom". So I have not been pulled into the hypnotic world of his movies entirely, but I can say that I am not an novice either. The current offering does however threaten to drag me into the pool with the other Anderson fanatics, because "The Grand Budapest Hotel" works incredibly well for my sensibilities and I expect that it will be a movie that I return to on many occasions in the future.  

Let me divide my comments into three particular sections so that you will be able to see the discrete joys contained in each element of the film. I'll start with the look of the movie. Anderson has shot this for a nearly square ratio. I don't remember if his other films have been does this way or not but I did think it worked pretty well for this story. This film is set for the most part in the early years of the Twentieth Century, when movies were presented in the nearly square format that became standard for televisions and was retaliated against by movie makers in the fifties by using widescreen formats. Even though the film is presented in a muted palate of colors, it still feels like a traditional thirties film in many ways. The set design and costumes also recall the grand days of Europe before the war with attentive concierges and lobby boys dressed in smart uniforms that contrasted well with the elegant designs of the hotels they worked in. There is wall paper in some of the rooms that recalls the complex geometric design of the carpets from the Overlook Hotel in "The Shining". The worn down modern designs in the lobby and the baths suggest a standard of beauty and wealth that are no longer within reach of the times or the culture.

Still on the look of the film, it would be unwise to ignore the photographic styles that are used to achieve some of the effects in the movie. There are clever animated bits with ski lifts and trollies that look just normal enough to fit into the movie but also just ethereal enough to make the images look slightly magical. The stairwells and kitchens also have an otherworldly film on them which makes the story feel distinctive. The prison is a cinematic tribute to movies from the past with convicts in striped uniforms and barred doors that look like meat lockers. The escape using two different ladders is completed by exaggerating each one in a way that is comic and acknowledges the cinematic roots of the comedy we are watching. There are a thousand little details that make the look of the film so distinctive. I would say that it bears more in common with the "Fantastic Mr. Fox" than it does with most of the other films of Anderson's that I have seen.

The second element that demands a recommendation is the script. The plot itself is clever enough and it is reminds me of one of those stacking Russian dolls, with another doll contained inside the first and than another inside the second. For instance, Tom Wilkinson plays a writer as an older man, who is portrayed by Jude Law as a younger version, who interacts with F. Murray Abraham who is portrayed as a younger man by newcomer Tony Revolori. It does not quite go back infinitely, but the story definitely reflects three distinct time periods and two of those get quite a bit of development. I won't say that the story is unimportant but I will say that what is most memorable for me is the dialogue. There are passages of script that just demand to be listened to. Much like Quentin Tarantino, the spoken word is poetry in the hands of Wes Anderson. Where Tarantino speaks the language of pop culture with lines that burn like lyrics to a song that you can't get out of your head, Anderson's dialogue is more like poetry. In fact the lead character speaks poetry on a regular basis but the poems are never completed although the thoughts behind them are always clear. There is great humor in the language and the way it is used in context and frequently broken up by the context as well. It always feels like there is narration, even when the narration has stopped because the characters style of talking is so in sync with the style of story telling.

Finally, I'd like to mention the depth of acting quality that permeates the film. Take a look at the cast and you will see nineteen Academy Award nominated performers and four winners lurking in the foreground, background and center stage of the film. Ralph Fiennes is a comic revelation, his manner is controlled mania. He eyes the other characters with the view of a man used to evaluating others and being able to sum them up in an instant, but still not understand how to appropriately interact with them. His manner is winning, even in the face of circumstances that should have his character screaming and running away. That's what makes those moments when he does just that feel so great, because he breaks free of the mannered style that he is accustomed to. F. Murray Abraham should work more in films. His career has not achieved the level of excellence we might have expected after his Salieri, but he has a weight to his presence and a manner in his voice that makes him perfect for his role as the older version of Zero the Lobby Boy that is Fienne"s protege. Saoirse Ronan has a lovely demeanor that shines through even though she has only a small amount of dialogue and has to work with a splotch on her face in the shape of Mexico. There are a dozen other surpises along the way and the casting is ninety percent of the success here.

This film will need to be seen a second or third time for me to absorb all the intricate pieces of film making that delighted me. It has an off beat charm and it provoked laughter in both visual and auditory stimuli. As I started off saying, the Wes Anderson filmography may be a little off putting for some, but if you are looking for a starting place, "The Grand Budapest Hotel" is a delightful and amusing way to start an addiction to his weird charms.