Benicio del Toro’s favourite Wes Anderson movie: “It’s a dark horse”
When you ask people if they’ve ever seen a Wes Anderson film, and they answer that they haven’t, it’s quite interesting to follow up by asking why that might be. Usually, you will get a reply that describes the movies they haven’t seen as ‘too clever’, or ‘too arty’ or ‘I don’t like Bill Murray’, which, depending on what you’ve read in the press, might be entirely possible.
But the truth is, Wes Anderson happens to make funny, engrossing and beautiful movies. The accusations of pretentiousness are really wide of the mark, because Anderson consistently makes movies that do what movies are supposed to do – tell a brilliant story that you can escape into with a cast of characters you find interesting.
Probably the best place to begin if you’ve never seen one is Rushmore, the 1998 comedy that essentially sets out the Anderson blueprint in only his second film. It is an amazing piece of work; astonishingly well written, properly funny, not just in a ‘oh how clever’ chortle way, emotional, wonderfully shot and with comic performances from the likes of Murray and Jason Schwartzman that have you catching yourself smiling inanely at the TV.
It kicked off a string of movies from Anderson that were completely unique and the quality of which never dipped across the next fifteen years or so. Yes, you knew what you were getting going into the likes of The Grand Budapest Hotel, or The Royal Tenenbaums or The Darjeeling Limited, but what you were getting was cinematic comedy, drama and acting of the highest order, every time, in exotic locations that made you want to pack a suitcase immediately.
While the last ten years have seen more of a mixed reaction to Anderson’s work – not everyone loved the nuclear surrealism of Asteroid City and adding Timothee Chalamet to his beloved rank of chosen actors is an acquired taste in The French Dispatch, Anderson returned this year with the chaotic The Phoenician Scheme, the Middle East-set black comedy with Benecio del Toro as wealthy tycoon trying to launch new business enterprises with his nun daughter while under the constant threat of assassination.
And del Toro has his own favourite film from the Anderson canon as he told Slashfilm: “I think it changes, but “Life Aquatic” is one that I took for granted and now I really enjoy it. It’s a dark horse.”
The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou is a 2004 film in which Anderson placed Bill Murray front and centre, the story of an intrepid oceanographer who sets out to find the shark that killed his former diving partner. With an ensemble cast including Anderson’s creative partner Owen Wilson plus Cate Blanchett, Jeff Goldblum and Willem Dafoe, it took many years to be properly appreciated – not faring well at the box office and misunderstood by critics.
Like many of Anderson’s films, it is a quirky and madcap tale. It has symmetrical shots where people just stare at the camera. And those title cards in yellow. In the end, it comes down to the simple fact that you either like them or you don’t.
Across his 13 movies, there are such similar boxes to tick in each one that sticking one on the TV is like slipping on a favourite jumper, one with holes in it that you don’t wear out of the house. But that might surprise you occasionally because it seems smaller or bigger now and then than you remember from last time. It’ll probably make you smile. And you’ll tell your friends they should buy one too. But you know they probably won’t.
