Chronic failure: how good is Anderson and how bad is Anderson

by time news

“The French Time.news” brings to fruition all that is great in Wes Anderson’s cinema, and also what is less great. Visually the film is invested at insane levels. The sets change every few seconds – I do not think I have ever seen so many sets in one film – and they are all beautiful and detailed. As always, in many of the scenes the people are placed in the frame spaces in meticulous, often symmetrical compositions, thus becoming part of the setting. The color gamut ranges from black and white to colorful canvases whose shades have been copied from films by French directors called Jacques. And on the virtuoso camera movements you can write articles and compose songs. Even the amusing music composed by the Frenchman Alexander Despela, who has worked with Anderson since his non-French films, is flashy (while writing the review I listen to the soundtrack with pleasure).

But the design excess that gives the “French Time.news” the look of a magazine, comes at the expense of the human factor – the one that made “Train to Darjeeling” and “Grand Hotel Budapest” my favorite movies in particular. I chose the image of a magazine because this time it was done explicitly. Structurally and visually, “The French Time.news” was designed as a supplement to an American newspaper from the 1960s, reporting on what was happening in the fictional French city of Envoy-sur-Belse, which resembled Paris as it appeared in films by directors named François, Jean-Luc and Albert. In the spirit of French existentialism, the literal meaning of the city name is something like “inaction on apathy”.

The fictional city ceased to empathize. “The French Time.news” (Photo: PR)

It is essentially an anthology film, like the ones that were accepted in France and Italy in the 1960s, and is all about a collage of tributes to French cinema and French culture in general. On the occasion of the death of the newspaper’s editor (Bill Murray), the latest issue is published in which three articles from the past taken from the sections on art, politics and food are published. The articles are presented to us as short films narrated by newspaper articles, and as is the case with most anthology films, only one of them is complete and interesting and also says something about the relationship between American tourists and French culture – a general theme arising from the existence of the “French Time.news”.

A collage of tributes to French cinema. "The French Time.news" (Photo: PR)

A collage of tributes to French cinema. “The French Time.news” (Photo: PR)

“The Concrete Masterpiece” – in the dual sense of “real” and “concrete” – tells the story of a celebrated French painter (Benisio del Toro), and reveals to us how his paintings actually reached a small museum in Kansas. Tilda Swinton is the journalist who gives a lecture on the painter who was discovered in a surprising place, Adrian Brody is the art dealer who discovered him, and Leah Saidou is the French representative – in each of the stories there is a symbolic representation of French actors. All players are coordinated with Anderson’s wave and present an expressionless game that refines the bold artificiality of the backdrops. This is definitely appropriate for Leah Saidou, an expressionless actress in other films as well.

Symbolic representation for French actors. "The French Time.news" (Photo: PR)

Symbolic representation for French actors. “The French Time.news” (Photo: PR)

Anyway, the film offers a witty portrait of an art trade and how to build a great reputation based on nothing. Due to his preoccupation with art as a subject, Anderson’s artistic language is more suited to this story than to the next two, which are far less plot-wise and dramatically crystallized and fade in the mouth like cotton candy.

Get lost in the general commotion. "The French Time.news" (Photo: PR)

Get lost in the general commotion. “The French Time.news” (Photo: PR)

“Corrections in the Manifesto” tells the story of the student riots in 1968, and how the journalist (Frances McDormand) got into the bed of one of the leaders (Timothy Shalama) and became part of the story she reported. There’s a nice idea here, but it gets lost in the commotion and does not develop into something interesting. The third story goes back to jail (Anderson’s favorite site – he also placed plot pieces in “Dog Island” and “Grand Hotel Budapest”) and is even less successful, even though it has great animated clips.

A war of attrition of design excess. "The French Time.news" (Photo: PR)

A war of attrition of design excess. “The French Time.news” (Photo: PR)

The design excess is reflected in both the running narrative patterns and the inflated cast (I counted six Oscar winners and five nominees). Anderson seems to have summoned for production almost everyone who has ever worked with him, though for many of them he has not provided roles. Willem Defoe, Edward Norton and Sirsha Ronen emerge for a moment and disappear. Even actors who make their Anderson debut here, like Christoph Waltz, Rupert Friend and Elizabeth Moss, don’t get to say more than a sentence or two. But because of their familiar faces they draw attention to themselves, and thus, through no fault of their own, impair the dramatic integrity of the stories. And so, despite all the beauty along the way, I came to the illustrated ending titles quite exhausted, as happens during tours of art museums abroad when we want to get to see everything.

★★★ 3 stars
The French Dispatch Directed by: Wes Anderson. With Tilda Swinton, Frances McDormand, Timothy Shalama, Benisio Del Toro, Adrian Brody, Bill Murray, Jeffrey Wright, Matthias Amelrick. USA 2021, 107 min

And on the other hand, how can one be angry about a movie with such frames. "The French Time.news" (Photo: PR)

And on the other hand, how can one be angry about a movie with such frames. “The French Time.news” (Photo: PR)


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