The French Dispatch, un film de Wes Anderson

It will soon be time to update your rankings of Wes Anderson movies. A new challenger enters the field.

Leaning very heavily into his brand, there.

Trailer for this tomorrow, I believe.

squee!

That cast is bananas. They had me at Bill Murray and Lea Seydoux, but Henry Winkler and Bob Balaban? Elisabeth Moss? Willem Dafoe? Saoirse Ronan? Angelica Huston (!?)

Talk about your embarras des richesses.

Some great stills at this New Yorker link…

A New Yorker inspired movie set in France by Wes Anderson… Well, that was unexpected…

Also, the cast is ridiculous at this point, and I don’t see how it can be anything else but just a checklist of cameos.

When does he not?

Cool! Looks like he’s playing around with aspect ratios again, like in Grand Budapest Hotel. Not long ago I would have thought “wider is better”, full stop. But he’s making a case for Academy ratio, wherein the verticality of things, of differences in height is heightened – where a subject can be pinned down like a butterfly in a butterfly collection, with no room for chewing on scenery.

Plus, what an interesting ensemble of actors, a unique plot, setting, etc.

There’s an actual moving camera shot at 1:34 of the trailer! My stars!

As a general rule I really REALLY don’t like Wes Anderson’s work, but I have to admit that trailer looks intriguing.

Yep, that looks like a Wes Anderson film, all right.

I’ve been looking forward to this movie all year. While reading an article about Dune (2020) being delayed to Dune (2021), I saw that this was also moved to October 16th, but then it was moved to ??? in the future. The studio made that decision during the summer but I missed the news. It’s certainly not a surprising decision. It makes sense to do so. It’s just a little sad.

Well, it is finally out!

I was mildly entertained, which was the most positive any three of us felt. Basically it’s three vignettes that might as well be totally unrelated, given how loose the connective tissue between them is. It feels like it never really gets going, because the every 30 minutes they’ll just press the reset button. So just lean back and let the pretty shots, clever transitions and outrageous situations wash over you.

If there was some overarching message or theme, it certainly went over my head.

That’s a shame. I could never get into Coen Brothers Netflix because it kept switching stories with no connective tissue. Ballad of something. Sometimes stories are too short to make an impact.

Some of the shorter pieces are really just a joke with a punchline. But the Tom Waits segment “All Gold Canyon” is worth seeing.

We’re planning to catch the French Dispatch at some point this weekend.

Lea Seydoux is in it, loved it. The characters get less and less human and more and more artificial with every new movie. I loved it anyways. I think some actors got paid by the minute. I wonder where he will go from here, he perfected his method. Now what?

Have to agree with @newbrof, this movie is maybe the most distilled essence of “Anderson-ness” I have seen so far.

The movie had a distinct “otherworldy” feeling to me, in part because of the framing device used to present the singular chapters and reminded me more of the feeling of being told a fairytale as a kid.

Like a fairytale, I got completely lost in it for the runtime of to movie, in part to the story but also due to the enchanting (other might say self-absorbed, but hey this is my review after all) presentation of colors, composition of the shots and the oblivious (read: great) portrayal of the characters by the actors.

I wonder if we will get broody 18-28 year old characters not played by Timothee Chalamet in the next 15 years, not that I’m complaining exactly.

All in all I am very happy that directors like Wes Anderson get the opportunity to make this kind of movie, so please go see it to keep the whole thing going!

I just thought recently, that it is a little wonder that Wes Anderson found his voice and had the chance to express it in modern day cinema. There are not that many directors with a unique cinematic style/voice.