2008 Woodie Awards
[critic]al thinking
Issue date: 11/6/07 Section: Arts and Entertainment
Wes Anderson is a goddamn genius
FILM REVIEW
"The Darjeeling Limited"
Fox Searchlight
Four Stars
By ROBERT DOWNEY Senior Staff Writer
"The Darjeeling Limited" is the story of three brothers, Jack (Jason Schwartzman), Francis (Owen Wilson) and Peter (Adrian Brody) one year after the death of their father, who take a spiritual train ride across India to find their recluse mother in a monastery to ask her why she didn't attend their father's funeral.
Wes Anderson got his start in theater. His films have a rigid stage-like quality to them. They're filled with highly saturated colors and outrageous costumes, and carefully constructed settings right down to the last detail.
"The Darjeeling Limited" is his fifth film and has been mostly panned by re¬viewers who have accused him of having a singular vision, and what they claim is his Anglo-centric latent racism toward Indian people … as well as his Anglo-centrism in general.
One of the best performances in the film is that of Irfan Khan, a famous Bollywood actor who plays the father of a dead boy that Brody tries to save. By not subtitling what he says, Anderson places all emphasis on what he feels adding to the power of the character, not detracting from him with language.
Fans of his first two, heartbreakingly sweet, low-budget pictures, "Bottle Rocket" and "Rushmore" bemoaned the branding of Wes Anderson, and what must have been the mil¬lions of dollars he made for, amongst other things, Adidas track suits, the red be¬ret industry and Kinks records.
"The Royal Tenenbaums," was his magnum opus.
That picture and the one that followed, "The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou," are highly introspective films in which Anderson examines and parodies his own style - his character's emotional backwardness and attention to their own image is indicative of this.
His modus operandi is that of an established framework and seeing how much he can pull our heart-stings within that framework.
FILM REVIEW
"The Darjeeling Limited"
Fox Searchlight
Four Stars
By ROBERT DOWNEY Senior Staff Writer
"The Darjeeling Limited" is the story of three brothers, Jack (Jason Schwartzman), Francis (Owen Wilson) and Peter (Adrian Brody) one year after the death of their father, who take a spiritual train ride across India to find their recluse mother in a monastery to ask her why she didn't attend their father's funeral.
Wes Anderson got his start in theater. His films have a rigid stage-like quality to them. They're filled with highly saturated colors and outrageous costumes, and carefully constructed settings right down to the last detail.
"The Darjeeling Limited" is his fifth film and has been mostly panned by re¬viewers who have accused him of having a singular vision, and what they claim is his Anglo-centric latent racism toward Indian people … as well as his Anglo-centrism in general.
One of the best performances in the film is that of Irfan Khan, a famous Bollywood actor who plays the father of a dead boy that Brody tries to save. By not subtitling what he says, Anderson places all emphasis on what he feels adding to the power of the character, not detracting from him with language.
Fans of his first two, heartbreakingly sweet, low-budget pictures, "Bottle Rocket" and "Rushmore" bemoaned the branding of Wes Anderson, and what must have been the mil¬lions of dollars he made for, amongst other things, Adidas track suits, the red be¬ret industry and Kinks records.
"The Royal Tenenbaums," was his magnum opus.
That picture and the one that followed, "The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou," are highly introspective films in which Anderson examines and parodies his own style - his character's emotional backwardness and attention to their own image is indicative of this.
His modus operandi is that of an established framework and seeing how much he can pull our heart-stings within that framework.
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