ASTEROID CITY Review

It seems with each new Wes Anderson project the distinction between the two halves of his films that are style and story, art and heart, aesthetic and dramatic become sharper. While I wouldn't say that throughout his nearly thirty-year career the auteur has ever been "great and terrible" as in one facet succeeds while the other fails miserably, I would say he's exercised a fair amount of "great and powerful" moments while also being unanimously "wonderful" in some fashion in most if not all his films. These phrases are obviously meant to allude to the character of the Wizard of Oz due to the fact Anderson has never felt more like the man behind the curtain than he does in Asteroid City. Opening with a live taping of a narrator discussing the writing of the story we're about to see unfold the framing and structuring of this venture will undoubtedly be too sophisticated for some viewers to grasp or too complicated for others to care about. While the story of the writing of the play the narrator is telling us about begins in September of 1955 the play itself takes place a thousand or so years in the future despite the traditional Anderson aesthetic that inherently implies the past. It's confusing, but not really a detriment to the experience as the battle, but more the integration between veneer versus reality is what fans of Andersons come to his films for. 

What hurts Anderson the most in the case of Asteroid City has more to do with the cavern between these aforementioned halves; the lack of said integration. The craft on display is top-tier Anderson, naturally, yet the emotional resonance fails to make an impact (pun intended) as the juxtaposition between the perfectly crafted world and the characters on the brink rings false this time. The key factor in this being that audiences are aware the people here are little more than characters; that what we're seeing is a performance rather than weighted experiences where a genuine insight or epiphany is taking place. That is what makes the less than handful of moments when the actors break while performing the play inside the movie because they recognize something in the context of the production that echoes a conflict in their personal life so exciting and enticing. Because there isn't enough real estate for Anderson to fully explore his nesting doll structure though, these cracks in the otherwise neat facade fail to leave much of a mark. There is no doubt the distance between the emotions the people and the characters are experiencing and the levity the visual stylings bring isn't intentional, but it almost feels intentionally broad so as to allow viewers to assign whatever meaning resonates most rather than Anderson and co-writer Roman Coppola having a certain theme, truth, or thought they are explicitly exploring.

Official Trailer for Wes Anderson's THE FRENCH DISPATCH

The first trailer for Wes Anderson's follow-up to his 2016 stop-motion film, Isle of Dogs, is here and is his first live-action film since what is arguably his masterpiece in 2014's The Grand Budapest Hotel. The French Dispatch “brings to life a collection of stories from the final issue of an American magazine published in a fictional 20th-century French city.” Per usual, Anderson rounded-up quite the cast for what will be his tenth feature with both new additions and some returning favourites. Bill Murray plays the editor of the aforementioned American magazine who is trying to put together this publication’s final issue. As this narrative is happening, the audience will see three different stories being covered by his staff members come to life in a way only Anderson could seemingly conceive. It is in bringing to life these three different stories that I assume Anderson adopts the different visual styles we see glimpses of in this first trailer; there is of course the black and white, but the predominant characters of those clips also appear in clips that are in color while there also looks to be a circular shot of a host of characters that feels very out of character for Anderson. The fact I'm wholly intrigued by a director's choice to use a certain kind of shot over his typical, perfectly symmetrical style of framing is proof enough as to why Anderson is not only engaging as a filmmaker, but as a storyteller in general. I don't even know where else to start with how excited I am about a new, live-action Wes Anderson movie for as much as I love his animated outings there is something about seeing him breathe his vision through a cavalcade of famous faces all perfectly embodying his sense of tone and timing that is both strangely exhilarating and reliably uproarious. And while The French Dispatch looks to not skew too far from what everyone loves about Anderson's work this does have the feeling of the filmmaker having done something very big and quite special to celebrate it being his tenth feature. I wholeheartedly expect Anderson to continue making his own brand of movie for as long as he has something to say, but it will also be interesting to see if he, in any way, is evolving his own style here for despite believing the man is incapable of spinning his wheels it does feel it will be necessary to continue to show growth-even if that growth is only through his storytelling prowess rather than his visuals. The French Dispatch also stars Owen Wilson, Adrien Brody, Wally Wolodarsky, Bob Balaban, Tilda Swinton, Frances McDormand, Timothée Chalamet, Léa Seydoux, Benicio del Toro, Henry Winkler, Elisabeth Moss, Griffin Dunne, Lyna Khoudri and opens on July 24, 2020.

Favorite Films of 2014 So Far...

There have been plenty of solid films come out this year already and we are only halfway through it. I say solid, but in no way does that mean many have been exceptional. It's funny really because in terms of quality this has been one of the better summer movie seasons in recent history. From the straight up, brisk nature of Neighbors to the full on-lampooning of sequels in 22 Jump Street this summers comedies have delivered while both Captain America: The Winter Soldier and X-Men: Days of Future Past have proved to be fine diversions in the super hero genre that seem to be breaking away from the formula that has become standard in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (here's lookin' at you, Thor). We've of course had smaller films that I have garnered a good appreciation for including Jon Favreau's return to small-scale movie-making in Chef and Nicolas Cage's return to actual acting in Joe, but the real surprise has been the typical (Godzilla, Edge of Tomorrow) and atypical (The Fault in Our Stars) summer fare that has really made this year a breeze so far. The two major animated releases have both come extremely close to that exceptional mark as The LEGO Movie is downright hilarious and has a unique take on what could have been a giant commercial while How to Train Your Dragon 2 is a beautifully realized continuation of Hiccup and Toothless' story that deserves to be seen on the big screen. I rather enjoyed Noah as well and look forward to re-visiting that film when it hits home video much in the way I enjoyed Snowpiercer which I saw and reviewed yesterday and you can read about here. Don't get me wrong there have still been plenty of mediocre to less than stellar films this year both in mainstream and arthouse releases (Pompeii and Under the Skin could crawl away and die for all I care), but the following five films are what struck me as either fascinating, substantial or flat-out awesome as I left the theater. Hit the jump to check out my top 5 of 2014 so far...

THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL Review

Wes Anderson's latest, The Grand Budapest Hotel is many things, but at its heart it feels like a quiet epic, a love letter to time gone by with a narrative spanning decades that chronicles the exceptionally unexceptional life of one young man who was influenced by another and would have his world forever changed because of him. It is as much about the world one creates around themselves and how it determines the outcome of ones life as it is about the actual plot of the story which, be not afraid, contains prison break-outs, gun fights, affairs with older women and a fair amount of lies and deception. Over the course of his career, Anderson has created many an interesting world where his characters find their typically odd yet perfect little worlds rocked by some kind of event. Whether it be the Tennenbaums, Steve Zissou or even Mr. Fox each of these characters have a way of trying to retain the normality that has escaped them in the time of their lives that Anderson's films have chosen to document. With The Grand Budapest Hotel things are only slightly different in that the screenplay itself, for the first time in his career, was written solely by Anderson and this more intimate relationship with the material certainly makes for a strong showing by the director, one in which it feels this film is the epitome of Anderson's imagination, that he is fully operating within the confines of his own imagination that he has come to be inspired to create through the works of Stefan Zweig and his consistent themes of becoming lost in ones reality and while not only has Anderson seemed to inhabit the role of Zweig here he has also come to imprint that same mentality on his main character, M. Gustave (Ralph Fiennes). Gustave, as one of our two storytellers overseeing the main narrative insinuates near the end of the film, may have come to live in a world that ceased to exist before he even entered it. It is this kind of thinking, these ideas beyond that of simply telling an entertaining story, but rather inspecting the mind of someone and how they look at their world and take on the challenges laid before them that makes Anderson's work so engaging and off-kilter, while this film in particular beautifully demonstrates the thin line that sometimes exists between real life and imagination.

First Trailer for THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL

I have always been a fan of Wes Anderson's work if not for the fact that he has a great story of how he and Owen Wilson met and made it into Hollywood, but for the fact he has kept his singular voice throughout his now illustrious career and continues to do so. Coming off what was likely his most mainstream success as well as being one of his better films last year in Moonrise Kingdom, Anderson has turned his sights on a script that for the first time he has written solely on his own. The Grand Budapest Hotel tells the story of a legendary concierge in 20th-century Hungary who takes a young employee (Tony Revolori) on as his protégé. Naturally the film looks to be much more complex than this as there is murder, scandal, and comedy thrown in for good measure all of which can be gauged in this excessively charming first trailer. The cast is ridiculous as the concierge is played by Ralph Fiennes in a rare comedic role that he looks to absolutely kill as well as the roles of Saoirse Ronan, Adrien Brody and Tilda Swinton getting nice moments here. The set design looks to be on a massive Anderson scale and the camera work is as stoic as ever with complex shots and framing done to the hilt (Anderson also shot this in three different aspect ratios; one for each of the time periods in which the film takes palce). If it is unclear I am beyond excited for this film and only hope that it lives up to the expectations I've always held for Anderson's work. The rest of the cast includes the likes of F. Murray Abraham, Edward Norton, Willem Dafoe, Jeff Goldblum, Jason Schwartzman, Jude Law, Harvey Keitel, Tom Wilkinson, Bill Murray and Owen Wilson. The Grand Budapest Hotel opens March 7, 2014.