This is an adventure
Wes Anderson’s latest film Asteroid City hit wide release on June 23 and earned 9 million at the box office, Anderson’s best single weekend performance.
When thinking about his films, I can’t help but think of high school, when I discovered his work.
The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou was the first film of his that I saw in a theater. Seeing an episode of Reel Comedy about the film attracted my interest. At that point I had not yet seen one of his films. Comedy Central giving airtime to promote the movie was all the endorsement I needed.
We went as a family to see it, I wasn’t driving yet and this was another instance of my mother indulging my film whims. Like parents before and after her, she sat through multiple films she hated for the sake of her children.
The Life Aquatic was one of those, though she did warm to at least one part in the film, “Be still, Cody!”
Going into the film, I had no idea what to expect as far as tone. The cast, premise and promotion on Comedy Central made me expect pure comedy. The melancholy was not anything I expected.
At that point, my film knowledge was pretty basic, I had an awareness of major and important films and stars from Looney Tunes cartoons, Simpsons audio commentaries and my own wading in the water.
I remember knowing that something bad was going to happen when the sound dropped out and that flash of red hit the screen. A perfect needle drop of “The Way I Feel Inside” turned on the waterworks and the encounter with the Jaguar Shark (“I wonder if it remembers me”) turned them back on again.
When I took a class on J.S. Bach in grad school, I was delighted to realize that “Loquasto International Film Festival,” was based on Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, BWV 140.
I was the only one in the family who really liked the film. With some exceptions, if my mother hated something, I probably enjoyed it and vice versa. Mom liked The Scarlet Letter, I hated it.
Mom hated Citizen Kane, she saw it in a film class she took, and I loved it, partly because of the numerous allusions The Simpsons made to it.
I see Wes Anderson as akin to the British Invasion. Those groups made music that synthesized their sensibilities and life experience through American rock & roll, creating something familiar yet new.
In Anderson’s body of work, one can view a similar cultural exchange. European art cinema as interpreted by a Texan.
Those films themselves were a synthesis of American cinema — such as westerns and noirs — and European milieu.
The musical equivalent is American power pop bands that worship at the altar of Lennon & McCartney.
To continue with this tortured comparison, Anderson is a gateway to films directed by auteurs just as The Rolling Stones were the first step on my path to Howlin’ Wolf.
The Life Aquatic put me on the path to Mon Oncle, Playtime, Masculin féminin and La Chinoise. My broader understanding of film has only enhanced my appreciation for Anderson’s films, just as listening to and learning about the blues added another layer of appreciation to the music it inspired.
Music is another area where Anderson’s influenced me. I was already very into the music of the 1960s, particularly the British Invasion, so I was already primed to like the songs featured in his films, some familiar and others brand new to me.
Initially, Rushmore was going to feature only songs by The Kinks, which I think would have worked very well with the film, but I’m glad they went a different direction. That’s how I learned about The Creation and that led down the path of getting into Freakbeat and similar bands.
The Royal Tenenbaums is a big reason why Between the Buttons is my favorite Stones album outside of that great 1968-1972 run. I like it for the same reason I like their psychedelic material: it’s not what they’re known for and represents a slight departure from norm. Between the Buttons feels like a Kinks record, fitting in somewhere between Face to Face and Something Else by the Kinks.Though I do find it funny that the version of the album depicted in the film goes from “Ruby Tuesday” to “She Smiled Sweetly” without even lifting the needle. I love “Connection” but that scene doesn’t work as well with that song.
That scene might be my favorite in the film, we’ve all experienced feelings that were inappropriate to express or perhaps the timing was wrong. It coming shortly after Richie Tenenbaum’s suicide attempts just adds to the power of the moment
“I've had a rough year, dad,” was always a line that stayed with me and even more so after the tragic death of my mother. 2019 set the record for a year going to pot for me, finding a murder-suicide just hours into the first day of a new year will have that effect. I appreciate its understatement. What else can you say when something truly awful happens, like the violent and sudden death of a loved one? There is nothing intelligent to say about a massacre.
At the time of its release, I felt underwhelmed by The Darjeeling Limited, though I did like the soundtrack which featured several Kinks songs as well as some great classical compositions, something that telegraphed the direction future soundtracks would trend. I revisited it last year and enjoyed it a lot more. It’s now been four and a half years since my mother was murdered but despite the passage of time the hurt gets worse and the heart gets harder.
Losing a parent, especially in that way way, leaves you rudderless. You turn to anything to find solace from your pain: drugs, sex, spirituality, mindless consumption, anything to distract you. None of that fills the hole they left in your life.
Loss is a common theme in Anderson’s films: Max Fischer’s mother is dead. Chas Tenenbaum’s wife is dead. Ned Plimpton’s mother is dead, the Whitman’s father is dead. It’s a pain the characters live with, “We both have dead people in our families,” is what Max says to Rosemary Cross after she tells him about her dead husband.
Anderson’s parents divorced when he was 8, he and his brothers lived with their mother and visited their father on weekends. That’s a different kind of loss, but one that shapes a person. I am also a child of divorce and don’t have a relationship with my father, but not by choice.
That role was filled by his father after my dad walked out. I remember talking with a friend about the announcement of Moonrise Kingdom around the same time my grandfather’s health started to decline. I remember texting them about that and the film as I walked across the campus of Indiana University.
Criticism of Anderson mostly misses the point and the proliferation of homages and parodies displays only a shallow understanding of his work. They can create symmetric shots and embrace the twee aesthetic but it lacks the power of the what it is aping. Similar to music when a band is unable to rise above its influences and synthesize that into something new.
Your A.I. generated Lord of the Rings Wes Anderson might get you clicks, but it won’t get you into heaven.