We Anderson is a director with quite possibly the most distinctive style in all of cinema. Colorful, cute, and slightly kitschy has become synonymous with his name. This aesthetic and style has influenced an “online platform for adventurers” which has in term inspired a book of photography. Wes Anderson has been a working writer and director since 1996 with hit films like The Grand Budapest Hotel and cult classics like The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou.
The key tenants of Wes Anderson’s particular style is best summarized by Thomas Flight’s great YouTube video about the subject. But I’ll attempt to summarize some of the key tenants:
- Shots tend to form a distinct background “plane” that remains appears “flat” relative to the characters. When a camera pans or cuts it often changes angle in 90 degree or 180 degree increments ensuring that different walls of a traditional 4-wall room can act as it’s own “flat” background plane. Tracking or dolly shots also tend to got directly forward, backward, left, or right maintaining this background plane.
- Characters tend to occupy and move in their own “plane” of shot, and they tend to be filmed looking directly at the camera, directly away from it, or perpendicular of the camera.
- Color and set dressing is very thoughtfully chosen not to provide “realism” but to provide interesting visual appeal. Characters don’t dress like real people, they don’t organize their belongings like real people.
- The plot of the film tends to present the action as a “story” of some kind. Sometimes as a book (The Grand Budapest Hotel), sometimes as a play (Rushmore), sometimes as a “movie in a movie” (Life Aquatic)
- Characters are often awkward with dialog that is completely unnatural. They exist in a world that doesn’t especially look or sound like our own.
- The setting of the film tends to have anachronistic qualities. It is often difficult to place a film in “time”, with elements seeming to come from multiple periods of time at once.
The key element for me is that a Wes Anderson movie luxuriates in being a movie. It doesn’t waste its time trying to make you “suspend your disbelief” you always know you’re watching a movie… and check out how “cool” this movie is.
So this first little writing project for me is that I’ll be watching each of Wes Anderson’s films and writing a short piece about each. What I write will be some weird amalgamation of “review” and “criticism”. Where I’ll be primarily exploring how the particular films fit into the Wes Anderson “brand” and how well they work in a modern context.
Before this embarking on this project I have seen 3 of Wes Anderson’s more recent films: The Grand Budapest Hotel, Moonrise Kingdom, and Asteroid City. But I’ve not actually seen any of his earlier work. I’ve been aware of his work for a long time and read plenty about him. The Thomas Flight video I linked above (and here again, you really should go watch it) is what most directly inspired me to jump in and see all of his work.
I’ll be doing each film in the order of release and linking them below as I complete my writing about them:
- Bottle Rocket – 1996
- Rushmore – 1998
- The Royal Tenenbaums – 2001
- The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou – 2004
- The Darjeeling Limited – 2007
- Fantastic Mr. Fox – 2009
- Moonrise Kingdom – 2012
- The Grand Budapest Hotel – 2014
- Isle of Dogs – 2018
- The French Dispatch – 2021
- Asteroid City – 2023
- The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Three More – 2024
- The Phoenician Scheme – unreleased