Settling down into the comfy sofas of my local Everyman Cinema, I recently found myself disappearing into a summer adventure in a fictional town crafted by one of the greats. Wes Anderson's newest masterpiece is a beautifully chaotic take on the inside and outside of a dramatic creation that flips the script (literally) on a story within a story. The 'set' follows a beautifully arid tumbleweed landscape that has been well and truly Wes Anderson-ed in its aesthetic.
The city is shown in cinematic widescreen and made to be truly immersive. The 'real' world, on the other hand, is a stark black and white stage, depicted in old school documentary screen ratio that throws back to the mid 20th century early days of television. Clearly, the blurring of reality and fiction are poignant to this film. And that isn't even almost the point of the actual film. Not that I'm entirely sure what that is...
There is an utter joy in enjoying a film that really truly does not have a singular message to give, but instead revels in the chaos of storytelling and the cumulation of lives bumping together under the most random and improbable circumstances. As we creep further into the summer of 2023, when the improbability of the years we have seen starts to fade, Asteroid City gives us the perfect escapism in which to sit, munch some popcorn, and get comfy.
"We're just two catastrophically wounded people who don't express the depths of our pain because... we don't want to". That statement says more to this film than you might think.
Wes Anderson gives us yet another unique masterpiece of film in Asteroid City. Anderson once again shows us the joy he finds in the visual arts, that just looking at the stills from this film show have been meticulously executed throughout. The attention to detail in Anderson's aesthetics literally takes my breath away - the colour matching of costume and setting, the colour grading in post production, the spacial awareness of set as well as the incredible skill of the camerapeople responsible. Ugh, I could go on for hours.
Asteroid City continues a line of films that feel grand and meaningful, while also being littered with deadpan jokes that break up the tension (and arguable confusion) of the plot. As always, this confusion is carefully camouflaged in an incredibly whimsical nostalgia that means even if you don't find a meaning in the story itself - although there are many places in which to find it - it doesn't matter because it's such an enjoyable watch regardless.
Bringing back the incredible Jason Schwartzman, who featured in Wes Anderson's second and still highly beloved film 'Rushmore', Asteroid City also features the recurring Edward Norton as a reclusive fictional playwright, a great performance but as ever nothing on Fight Club. Norton's scenes are narrated beautifully by none other than Breaking Bad's Bryan Cranston, who describes Asteroid City as the fictional setting of Norton's play. As you can see, there are a lot of big names in Anderson's latest film. And that d0esn't even mention ScarJo and Tom Hanks!
So what are all these big name actors doing hanging around in a Western style ghost town hosting a Space Camp to celebrate the anniversary of their asteroid crater. The Space Camp hosts the most intelligent young scientists around, as well as their futuristic inventions. Each of these teens has their own story, their own quirks, their own impact on the chaotic plot of Asteroid City that I truly found a joy to watch. One of these children is the son of Augie, who ends up stuck in Asteroid City with his family by accident.
Their whole family are grieving the death of his wife, their mother, and this becomes a centrepoint of the sentimental moments in this film - and perhaps the overarching exploration of its message. I won't be able to go through the whole plot of this film in a single review, but I want to focus on the process of grieving that the Steenback family go through during their adventures in Asteroid City. This won't exactly be spoiler free, but I won't be revealing any major plot points so don't be afraid to read on if you haven't seen the film itself.
Augie meets Midge (ScarJo) and the two of them hit it off by discovering their strange common ground, despite their differences and the fact they exist in entirely different social universes. If you'll excuse the pun. At one point in the film, Midge describes their beautifully painful connection with "We're just two catastrophically wounded people who don't express the depths of our pain because... we don't want to". That statement says more to this film than you might think. There is so much going on in this film but it never seems to quite name the feelings its trying to discuss - a beautifully deliberate glance into the modern human.
I have heard mixed reviews from audiences of Asteroid City, and I completely understand why. The film is beautiful chaos. You can go into it looking for a single train of thought and you won't find it. Instead, what you'll find it an incredible mish mash of joy and pain colliding into each other in a tiny isolated corner of the world - and perhaps even coming from outside it too, but no spoilers - at the rate of an asteroid tunnelling into a crater. If you are intrigued, I would politely encourage you to take a spot inside that crater and enjoy the joyfully painful lives of its visitors unfolding in front of you this summer. Feels kind of apt for where we are in 2023.
Until next time,
Alice xoxo
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