GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL - Wes Anderson, March 2014

[AndyDursin]

Good to see the F. Murray Abraham comeback tour (between this and his HOMELAND role) in full swing!

[Monterey Jack]

Gee, think this will have slow motion, wide-angle lenses, a "quirky" soundtrack and jokes so deadpan they virtually flatline?

[AndyDursin]

And...what's your point?

I'm not a big fan of every one of his movies, but I loved MOONRISE KINGDOM...and at this point, I will gladly take a new Anderson movie over most of the big studio CGI/animated kiddie cartoon/comic book stuff we're getting nearly every week, even if it's a given what it's going to be like.

[Mike Skerritt]

On the one hand, this looks entertaining as hell. On the other hand, I really wish Anderson would do something different one of these days. I realize that's unfair in a way because, as Andy correctly points out, his work is still better than the vast majority of what comes out these days. But still I feel like he's limiting himself. The Coens, for example, have spent a career injecting their sensibilities into different genres. I'd love to see what Anderson could do with a noir thrillier, for instance. Even if it's quirky and twee and the killer's lair is decked out with board games.

[AndyDursin]

On the one hand, this looks entertaining as hell. On the other hand, I really wish Anderson would do something different one of these days. I realize that's unfair in a way because, as Andy correctly points out, his work is still better than the vast majority of what comes out these days. But still I feel like he's limiting himself. The Coens, for example, have spent a career injecting their sensibilities into different genres. I'd love to see what Anderson could do with a noir thrillier, for instance. Even if it's quirky and twee and the killer's lair is decked out with board games.

Excellent point Mike, I think you nailed it. I admire all of his films because they're singularly "his" -- even the ones I was less than crazy about -- but it's true that the Coens have dabbled in different genres, especially late. Perhaps at some point he'll make a movie that's not necessarily a "Wes Anderson movie" with the requisite quirks -- but even so, I find revisiting his films to be a welcome occurrence with most of the bland, interchangeable fare we have out there today.

[AndyDursin]

Glowing reviews from Variety and Hollywood Reporter are out. Sounds like Anderson is in top form, and a solid follow up to MOONRISE KINGDOM:

One of the more frequent accusations leveled at Wes Anderson — that he’s a filmmaker who favors style over substance — will ring even hollower than usual after “The Grand Budapest Hotel,” a captivating 1930s-set caper whose innumerable surface pleasures might just seduce you into overlooking its sly intelligence and depth of feeling. As intricately layered as a Dobos torte and nearly as rich, this twisty tale of murder, theft, conspiracy and unlikely friendship finds its maker in an unusually ambitious and expansive mood — still arranging his characters in detail-perfect dioramas, to be sure, but with a bracing awareness of the fascism, war and decay about to encroach upon their lovingly hand-crafted world. The result is no musty nostalgia trip but rather a vibrant and imaginative evocation of a bygone era, with a brilliant lead performance from Ralph Fiennes that lends Anderson’s latest exercise in artifice a genuine soul.

Indeed, if “Saturday Night Live’s” recent parody trailer for “The Midnight Coterie of Sinister Intruders” offered a hilarious suggestion of what a Wes Anderson slasher thriller might look like, then “The Grand Budapest Hotel” is as close as the director is likely to come to making an out-and-out action movie — albeit one where secret assignations occur between two cable cars passing in midair, and a neatly diagrammed chase sequence finds Gustave and Zero sledding downhill in cold pursuit of a villain on skis. While these setpieces may elicit as many groans as gasps, there are nonetheless a few real frissons of suspense, giving full expression to the latent violence that has occasionally punctured the filmmaker’s pristine surfaces; it’s not every Anderson twee-fest that features a strangulation, a beheading and a few severed digits. The startling impact of these moments underscores the essential seriousness of the director’s approach, and those who mistake the picture for an over-decorated confection might be surprised by its unusually sharp, acrid flavor.

http://variety.com/2014/film/reviews/be ... 201088058/