AS A WES ANDERSON devotee, I was going to watch this film with no regard for reviews or hubbub about it aforehand. As with The French Dispatch, his most recent full feature, this movie will require another viewing; there’s too much detail to consume and it goes by too quickly.  The cast is replete with stars and familiar faces for Anderson’s film.  Tom Hanks, Scarlett Johannson, Liev Schreiber, and Bryan Cranston are all new (I think). Jason Schwartzman and Edward Norton are among the veterans.

My initial reaction was that Anderson had become too stylized and too cute. He felt the need to frame the film as a movie about a play. For me, his movies will always survive a viewing because they are completely unpredictable, impeccably shot, and contain unique and compelling characters.

This one, though, like the last, went too quickly through the story in the way a squirt-gun drink is not as refreshing as a drink taken from a glass or a straw at your own pace–and I am not going to backup and rewatch a movie the first time through.

While I can’t blame him for wanting to evolve as a filmmaker, the audiences already seem to be blaming him for creating too much aesthetic distance in his works: he’s starting to make movies for himself, his actors, the critics or other directors–and that’s fine: they will be the only ones buying tickets if he keeps it up.

 

WRH