This might be the first time I’ve been apprehensive about reviewing a film, not because of the film itself, but because I doubt I’d be able to improve upon what a certain other critic has already said about this feature. And here it is: A piece written by Aussie critic Grant Watson that might be the best review I’ve ever read for any movie. The act of critique is built from one’s unique perspective on art and the environment that fosters it, and while I certainly have my own thoughts on this film, part of me is kind of jealous that I wasn’t able to come up with something that all-encompassing on the subject. So, basically, in addition to forcing this write-up through a haze of molten summer brain, I’m also having to fight back the first time I can recall having writer’s envy over another reviewer’s work. I might as well be a character in a Wes Anderson film myself.
As I got into last time I looked at a Wes Anderson production, the man has a distinctive style that, on occasion, ventures into being so meticulous and noticeable that it ends up distracting from the story that style is being used to tell. However, that’s not all there is to Wes Anderson’s most recognisable traits as a filmmaker. Something else that shows up regularly, like in The Grand Budapest Hotel and especially with his latest, is how a lot of the film craft on display doesn’t even feel like film craft.
The writing is closer to literary prose than ordinary film dialogue, designed to be read but not necessarily out loud. The set design and the spot-lighting lean more into theatrical staging than cinematic mise-en-scéne (particularly in the second act with its segmented backdrops and even a mock-up of an in-universe stage play). The camera work still sticks to Anderson’s perfectly symmetrical framing, but it also ventures into looking more like still photography than motion, like a reference for a painting. Even its brief flashes of animation look closer to the original Tintin books than anything in the American mainstream.
It’s cinema as the culmination of every other form of media that either preceded it or operates right alongside it. Add to that the frequently-shifting aspect ratios, and flicking back forth between black-and-white and colour footage (it’s like watching Homer Simpson adjust his hospital bed), and there is never a dull moment to be had in this 108-minute feature. Rather than drawing me out of the moment like what kept happening with Isle Of Dogs, all this chiselled and multi-layered creativity just kept bringing me further and further in. This is seriously one of the most visually-inventive features I think I’ve ever covered on here.
And what makes all that evident talent work that much more is the story it’s all in service to. Or, rather, stories. Much like with the visual aesthetic, the story is also contained within layers of intertextuality, consisting of three articles for the titular newspaper that, in their own ways, each deal with a writer telling the story of an artist living in the town of Ennui-sur-Blasé (which might be the closest we’ll ever get to a film being set at the intersection of Boring and Boring).
After a brief overture from Owen Wilson describing the history of the town, we get the first act, where J.K.L. Berensen (Tilda Swinton) narrates the story of painter Moses Rosenthaler (Benicio Del Toro), whose work gets high-art-community attention while he was in prison for murder. The second involves Lucinda Krementz (Frances McDormand) doing a profile on a group of student activists, led by young revolutionary Mitch-Mitch (Timothée Chalamet). And the third has Roebuck Wright (Jeffrey Wright) attend a private dinner for the local police that eventually turns into a hostage situation.
As an ensemble piece (and especially from someone who has made damn-near an entire career out of such ventures), everyone here does well with their roles, and a lot of their characters are based on real-world writers and journalists. And through the idiosyncratic spins that their respective stories take, a lot is said about the creative process. Its connection to the creator, the creator’s connection to their muse, to their patrons, to the politics of the market their work exists within, all with the framing device of a long-running publication putting out its last-ever issue. It’s a look at the transition from the old way of doing things into the new… and how that uncertain void on the horizon is a pretty daunting thing to look at for too long.
Like with most other films I review on here, I get the feeling that where my own life has been going over the last few weeks is influencing how receptive I am to this film’s take on the ways of the writer. This month has seen me get officially recognised as a voice worth reaching out to for one of the biggest film studios in the world, and has let me turn my decade-long dream of being a professional writer into a bona fide reality (yeah, for those who missed me mentioning it on my socials, I am now a paid contributor for FilmInk); there’s a lot I can appreciate about the passion and drive and fictional-stranger-than-fiction fuelling these characters. Hell, with how recent years have felt particularly hostile towards journalists, especially over in the U.S., there’s even some timeliness in its message.
But ultimately, it’s the whole package that I find myself enamoured with. The oodles of visual panache on offer combined with the consistently entertaining storytelling make for a terrific feature, one of Wes Anderson’s best to date. It is as much a tribute to journalists of all stripes as it is to all the different disciplines that cinema shares with other forms of art, and beyond being fascinating in its construction, it’s just a seriously entertaining watch.
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