The French Dispatch

Kansas Evening Sun is closing with the death of its editor. It has a foreign bureau in post-war Paris run by Arthur Howitzer Jr. (Bill Murray) who has cultivated a stable of eccentric writers. This follows three of the articles. This is a Wes Anderson film.

This has the Wes Anderson cohorts with a few new members. The style is all him and I love it. I love Moses and Simone. I really like the first story. I wouldn't mind if that's the whole movie. The second story is interesting but Wes is essentially taking pot shots at young idealistic protesters. I kept thinking that some younger viewers are going yell out Boomer at the screen. It's trying to be humorous but it's missing that other point of view. The third story is the least interesting to me. I'm not sure if it's the structure or the actual story. I really lost interest by that point. I wish that this is a whole movie about Moses and his artistic adventures.

A triumph of style and artistry, The French Despatch is also witty and clever, but it might leave you cold if you don't like the quirky, arty, and, frankly, sometimes quite pretentious and self-indulgent Wes Anderson approach. Like other films of his, it's marvellous to look at, there are some funny moments from the huge star studded cast, and despite the reservations mentioned, the French Despatch is classy.

I suppose the gamble of any film told in a series of vignettes is to capture the rapt attention of your audience in one segment only to lose it in the next (see: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs).

None of the vignettes in The French Dispatch ever truly lost me, but one came close. And it's not to say that particular story was poorly written or directed or performed, it's simply that the one preceding it was so dazzling and fantastic I wasn't quite ready to move on from it.

Moving on is a large part of this film as it never stops marching forward both literally and figuratively. It has (a) large story(ries) to get through and if you can't keep up...sorry. No crying.

The French Dispatch is a film told in five parts. Three articles bookended by an introduction and an epilogue. These five pieces make up the final issue of the magazine titled (wait for it): The French Dispatch. We "read" the final issue by watching the articles unfold through Wes Anderson's beautiful, obsessive, whimsical lens.

Visually this is an Anderson film cranked to 11. The photogenic establishing shots, contrasting symmetry, and pastel color scheme of his entire career drenches every shot of this film. The picture beautifully shifts from black and white to color, and always at the perfect moment. His creative and effective use of animation and miniature sets are mesmerizing.

Basically if you don't like Anderson's style you're really, truly going to hate this movie, but your mind was probably already made up.

Seeing this in a theater packed full of micro-beanie, gold wire framed glasses wearing hipsters reminded me of why I don't typically like seeing Anderson's films on opening weekends. There is exactly one reason to ever talk during a movie, and that's if there is a fire, after that there is not one good reason to ever speak in a theater, especially if you're talking directly to the screen which a handful of these people did.

The French Dispatch is an excellent film and Anderson is an excellent filmmaker. I think his style and creativity are a much needed burst of originality on the canvas of filmmaking. It also just made me feel nice after watching The Last Duel, that movie stole a piece of my soul... I like unconventional filmmakers, I like divisive filmmakers, and even in his missteps, I'll continue to be excited by and support Wes Anderson.

The French Dispatch is a French subsidiary of a Kansas newspaper. Every week it provides articles from renowned journalists. When the long-serving editor dies, as per his wishes The French Dispatch closes but not before a final edition. In it are four articles, details of which the film illustrates.

I generally enjoy Wes Anderson's films and have seen all of them with Rushmore, The Fantastic Mr Fox and The Royal Tenenbaums being my favourites. They tend to be quirkily funny but can be difficult to get into. With his recent films Anderson has also amped up the special effects and cinematography, making the films visually more stylish and art-like.

This is not a problem as long as the visual effects don't replace a good plot. With The French Dispatch, that's exactly where the problem lies.

We have a central story - the final edition of a newspaper - plus four sub-stories (the four articles) none of which prove to be very engaging. Things just happen, sometimes in very haphazard, random ways with no attempt to draw in the audience. While quirky, none of the stories are funny enough to make the film a comedy and carry it that way.

The cinematography and special effects are stunning but without a decent plot and level of engagement they're just nice-to-look-at images, bereft of meaning.

Also can't fault the cast which is heavily star-laden: Benicio Del Toro, Bill Murray (as always, for a Wes Anderson film), Adrien Brody, Tilda Swinton, Frances McDormand, Lea Seydoux, Timothee Chalamet, Jeffrey Wright, Owen Wilson, Bob Balaban, Henry Winkler, Elisabeth Moss, Christoph Waltz, Alex Lawther, Liev Schreiber, Willem Dafoe, Edward Norton, Saoirse Ronan, Jason Schwartzman. Such is the saturation of stars that some only appear for 20 seconds or so!

Wes Anderson has made many films people have loved as well as many films people are baffled by and don't understand nor like. This isn't a complaint...it just IS what Anderson's films are like to the average viewer. However, some of his movies are clearly much more approachable than others. "The French Dispatch" is NOT one of the more approachable films...it clearly will appeal mostly to the hard-core Anderson freaks.

The film is broken down in to several stories that are interconnected by the same narrator. The first, about an insane modern artists and the sycophants who love his art--despite his multiple beheadings...which have gotten him locked up in a psychiatric prison. I think this is a very funny and insightful look at pretentious art lovers. The other stories also involve pretentious people but to me seem to have little in the way of payoff. The young revolutionary bit is mildly amusing and pokes fun of the 1960s young peoples' revolution in Paris and the kidnapping bit really left me cold.

The bottom line is that all the stories are surreal and just plain weird.... and I assume most people will like some and hate other portions of the film. So, I am not a fan of the story overall. But I was blown away by the cinematography, artisic sets and strange look of the film...this is probably THE reason to see the movie...not the plot itself. A great example is the scene showing the transition from a young demented artist to an older one...which was very clever. Overall, a film I didn't particularly like but I definitely respected.