Wacky Wes’ fiction a little too strange
Anthology of stories a mixed bag
To call Wes Anderson’s latest flick quirky would be like saying water is wet.
Even for a man who has directed the likes of The Life Aquatic and The Grand Budapest Hotel, there is a level of oddness here that you rarely see in film.
Anderson’s love letter to journalism sees him bring a collection of stories published in a magazine based in a fictional twentieth century French city to vivid life on screen.
It’s broken down into four main stories book-ended by the death of the magazine’s editor, Arthur Howitzer Jr. (Bill Murray).
Like any anthology, some tales are stronger than others and, for me, The French Dispatch peaks with its first two stories – The Cycling Reporter and The Concrete Masterpiece.
The former is a riotous, quick runthrough of the streets of Paris by Owen Wilson’s deadpan Herbsaint and the latter features brilliantly bizarre turns from Benicio Del Toro (Moses), Léa
Seydoux (Simone), Tilda Swinton (J.K.L. Berensen) and Adrien Brody (Julian) in a dynamic dissection of modern art and the lengths people will go to for profit and romance.
Revisions to a Manifesto is fine – and Timothée Chalamet (Zeffirelli) and Frances McDormand (Lucinda) impress – but dragged on too long before ending abruptly.
My least favourite tale was the concluding The Private Dining Room of the Police Commissioner.
This is Anderson at his over-indulgent worst. It’s a bombardment of images and characters that don’t quite gel and the use of comic-book-style animation during one sequence felt unnecessary and excessive.
But even when Anderson’s flick threatens to veer off a cliff, the incredible, enormous cast he has got on board offer welcome distractions; Edward Norton, Saoirse Ronan, Henry Winkler, Christoph Waltz and Willem Dafoe are among those who make fleeting appearances.
It’s a pity, though, that we didn’t see a little more of Murray as he’s always an actor you want to spend screen time with.
The French Dispatch is too uneven and unwieldy to be vintage Anderson, but you’ll still have fun watching the director’s creative juices flow.
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