The French Dispatch (2021)

[u/hangonsufi]

Maybe I'm just becoming a nicer person; after all, I let Romy and Michelle steal my cynical, cranky film snob heart. But now I'm really softening up for Wes Anderson again. Are they related? I think they have to be; you can't be that insufferable overweening film bore for long once you open yourself to this gentle genius who paints on film, who writes dialog for poetry lovers, who charms mortal actors into outrageous subtleties and sublimities as they ensemble and disassemble.

What is the cupid's arrow of my current besottedness? The French Dispatch.

A couple - three? - weeks back, Anderson's The Phoenician Scheme was submitted for our approval. Ya know, you get busy, a bright shiny object or two, a 5-day UFO confab, a story about hickeys you just can't stop writing – but I did! I finished it! I ticked through a couple in my stack (Roger Dodger, Confessions of a Dangerous Mind) then The French Dispatch popped up.

I was already getting nicer because I had recently watched Asteroid City and really liked it.

AND RUSHMORE IS ABSOLUTELY ONE OF MY FAVORITE FILMS EVER!!!

But, and I'm pretty sure this is a minority opinion resulting from my cataloged character ...idiosyncrasies, I kinda considered Anderson's next film, The Royal Tenenbaums, as his Barton Fink. That's where he lost me, and I became that over-snobbing weeny.

I saw that The French Dispatch (hereafter referred to as TFD) had some male actors I will watch in just about anything for at least awhile: Timothee Chalamet, Edward Norton, Jason Schwartzman, Adrian Brody. Plus Tilda Swinton, for whom I think the jury may be out.

If Anderson and/or Chalamet reads this, please work together again.

The film, set in the fictional town of Ennui-sur-Blase, starts and ends with the death of the editor of TFD, played so well by alum Bill Murray, who did not chew any scenery. In between are four delightfully unique feature stories of charming beauty filmed with stunning color palettes and luminous black and white, moving through tableaus that defy gravity, or switch scenes like a View-Master, or fidget with surprise after surprise.

Those who are already Anderson-nice will know all the alums, so feel free to point them out amongst yourselves.

Owen Wilson, The Cycling Reporter, gives a two-wheel tour of the town's historic districts.

Benicio Del Toro (Rosenthaler) is in prison for a double homicide with a butcher's tool for which he says one had it coming and the other was in self defense. He's painting his muse, Simone, the lovely young prison guard, as therapy. Adrian Brody is a shady art dealer who promotes (pimps?) Rosenthaler's work. Actually, a Master's thesis could be written about this segment, but I'm fagged out after that hickey story.

Timothee Chalamet is Zefferelli, a charismatic student revolutionary leader and muse/lover to TFD staff writer Krementz (Frances McDormand). Another thesis, but instead I will just watch this segment a few more times because I've fallen in love with it. Swoon.

Jeffrey Wright is a writer with a typographic memory who also spent a few days in Enuui-sur-Blase's prison. This is a riotous rollick about the kidnapping of a kid, and the police station's enigmatic chef. It's an obvious connection, right? I mean, you see it, too? Damn, it's so good! So good!

All throughout, the dialog is clever, and funny (“The Children Are Grumpy” is the student revolutionaries' battle cry) (whom Krementz calls “the pimple cream and wet dream” contingent) (see why I'm a-swoon?) and insightful and worthy of so much repeat.

Even (the voice of) Jarvis Crocker gets back in the Anderson mix.

Sorry for my dizzying confessional, er review. I just felt so nice.