La Vie aquatique

This story is a lighthearted adventure comedy. I too am guilty of being one of those Wes Anderson fans who salivate over all the small details but while watching this I quickly detached myself from the director and his style and previous work and just let "The Life Aquatic" take me along. And that's what you have to do. It's different from his other stuff in that it's more plot driven. There are some wonderful characters but they have to deal more with outside complications than internal struggles. It is similar in tone and style to Robert Altman's "M*A*S*H," what with all the juggling of fighting and death (serious themes dealt with in an objective comedic manner). There's also some Fellini moments (it was mostly filmed at Cinecitta). I loved it. Don't go into this film as a biased hipster Wes Anderson fan, clean the slate and take it with an open mind. It's certainly sillier than Rushmore or Tenenbaums, but it's just as ambitious and exponentially courageous with shots and tone.

To reiterate: more action oriented, funny as all get out, and quite possibly the funnest I've had in a theater all year.

Listen, it isn't the most artsy film on earth. It doesn't have the richest plot ever. What it has is Bill Murray and Owen Wilson teaming up with Wes Anderson to portray a wonderful story. To like any of those three involved is to like this film. Definitely worth 2 hours out of any life, unless you'll be dying in less than 2 hours. This movie signifies the new way of storytelling for movies to come for years. The days of the old-fashioned drama starring a powerful actor, supported by wonderful character actors is over. To be a good movie anymore, the lead must have the capability to play more than himself in real life (i.e. Bruce Willis is always Bruce Willis). Bill Murray fits the mold perfectly, as he portrays the washed-up sea adventurer. Not to mention the wonderful cast around him, the best performance coming possibly from Willem Dafoe (who is great in every movie he's in).

I'm not generally a fan of Wes Anderson. He relies too heavily on the charm of detachment. Burton has this problem too, hidden under the humorous tone. The appeal is a generational thing and I guess I'm too old to simply find that enough.

But here, he does something different than what I have seen elsewhere from him. I think it is because the Owen influence is small here. The form is a movie about making a life which is a movie. Both the movie and the movie within have fantastic elements, but we do have a clear shift to brighter colors and crisper landscapes when within the inner world.

Its all based on synthetic notions of drama: love, purpose, worth. When you sneak up on things this way, you have to play a delicate game, one I think Wes usually flubs. You have to engage by setting a distance that is far enough from the norm that we as viewers can lean into it, and near enough to what we think of as real flesh that we want to.

Bill Murray doesn't understand this balance, because he's all about distance. Never mind, he's just an actor. So you select actors that try for the closeness. Dafoe and Blanchett get this. What they choose to do is simple: they form a real person and layer some cartoonish mannerisms on top. We see through the play and value the real underneath, where we cannot with Murray and Wilson.

Because the whole thing can blend together, we get a wonderful balance of this tension: engagement and studied apartness. I credit Anderson with maintaining this container. It works. And it works because he was smart. You can see that he understands this dynamic well enough to know that we will be impatient with his tricks for very long. So the movie changes tone as it moves along. It changes slowly with less emphasis on the personal abstraction and more on abstracting the physical: the ship, the rooms, beds, sub. It allows Cate to present her womb, which is quite a miracle.

If you read the trivia at IMDb, you find that many top actresses wanted this part. So it is pretty amazing that Cate's condition as a pregnant woman who knows how to turn herself inside out was able to have that condition become so central to the world we see.

This isn't quirky. This isn't comedy. This is extremely sensitive positioning of the audience to allow for deeper penetration. Its a triangulation of "Incident at Loch Ness" and "Cowards Bend the Knee ."

I felt blessed watching it.

Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

I revisited this about a decade on from when I first watched it. Wes Anderson movies typically feel a little less interesting to me when I revisit them (so he's like the opposite of David Lynch or the Coen Brothers in that regard), so maybe that's why I had reservations about going back to this. But I'm happy to say that The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou worked even more for me a second time, and I think it's right up there as one of Anderson's best.

This might not be a popular opinion, but I feel like he's been pushing it with the artificiality too much in his recent films, to the point where I can't really engage with them emotionally. From a technical perspective, The Grand Budapest Hotel, Isle of Dogs, and The French Dispatch are all phenomenally well put together, meticulously crafted, and easy to appreciate when it comes to style/visuals. However, they just don't do it for me when it comes to feeling the film, or engaging with the characters. There's just a little too much detachment and/or too many characters. Maybe the films are too well put together. The human element that's apparent in his older films often feels missing.

With most of his stuff made before 2014, there's obviously that Wes Anderson style, but there's just a little more warmth and humanity. They're the right level of detached, to the point where they're not even really emotionally detached at the end of the day. His earlier films can be tremendously moving, and I think The Life Aquatic is a good example of that; the reality is heightened and the characters a little extreme, but not to the point where you detach emotionally. There's plenty of zaniness and quirky humour (not all of it perfect, but most of it works), but there's a heart to the whole thing, and I feel a similar way about The Royal Tenenbaums and maybe even Rushmore.

Maybe I miss the old Wes - I kind of love the old Wes, and I still appreciate the hell out of the new one, but something's missing. I fear the upcoming Asteroid City will be more new Wes than old Wes; it's like he keeps doubling down on it after it worked admittedly well in Grand Budapest Hotel.

Oh well. At least we'll always have Steve Zissou (the last 10-15 minutes of this also stands as the best sequence in Anderson's career so far, especially due to the perfect use of Sigur Ros).

What a stunning body of work Wes Anderson has created. I will be honest, when I first saw the previews to this film I was worried that Anderson may have gone the way of so many other directors who have developed their name in Hollywood. Art is replaced by money, which is replaced by angry fans. I saw the CGI fish and began to feel a sweat break with nervousness. Will he be able to continue the humor from Bottle Rocket, the darkness of Rushmore, as well as the ensemble connectedness from The Royal Tennanbaums? Well, folks, I am here to announce that he has taken the Hollywood money and has not veered too far off his signature course. I always imagine Anderson's work as a very dry martini. His humor, the most intelligent work I have seen in a long time, is like the liquid itself, creating this bold texture while packing a powerful emotional punch. The olives are the cast, giving just some extra to nibble on while you enjoy the entire drink. Place these elements together, the drink and olives, and you have The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou.

To begin with, this film would not have worked without anyone else in the lead than Bill Murray. His ability to contain himself while also giving us the emotional stress of being a first-time dad as well as loosing his best friend is Oscar worthy. He is the perfect guide for our trip, giving us that knowledgeable laugh as well as those sympathetic eyes that seem to shout, "Everything will work out". He is bold and smooth as both the Captain of the vessel as well as learning the tricks of being a father. His ability to deliver his lines was both crucial and beautifully timed giving us just enough to make us fall in love with him by the end of the film. Coupled with his amazing performances is the work of everyone else involved. Willem Dafoe proves that he can handle any role, big or small, and make it very memorable. My favorite character during this voyage was Cate Blanchett's role that nearly stole the show from Murray. Her multi-depth character gave us just the distraction that we needed to see the power of the father/son relationship. Her quirks take us deep into the human soul and give us a mother's perspective to this mission. It is a beautiful counter to Murray's passive/aggressive father figure. Goldblum is quickly becoming a favorite actor of mine, while Huston proves that she still has the ability inside of her. Both of these guys need to see more work. The rest of the eclectic cast ranges from the hilarious "interns" to the melancholy songs of David Bowie (see if you can spot them!). Even Noah Taylor (of Vanilla Sky fame) turned out a stunning performance. The cast shines through beautifully, playing off each other, giving us some of the best performances of the year.

I will admit, Anderson's comic narrative will leave this dry taste in your mouth, but for me it was a great experience. His humor is dry, his films are dry, but that is what makes him different than others in his field. He gives us those long pauses and obscure references that will either force you to think or create frustration because you do not understand his meaning. I have grown up on his films since seeing Bottle Rocket, and I love the way this man creates. One of my favorite lines and scenes in this film that I have raved to everyone as the epitome of an Anderson film was when Zissou first takes Ned to the island and Eleanor tells Steve that one of his cats died. After some banter, Ned asks what type of cat it was. Zissou replies "Who cares. A tabby I think…" which isn't funny at first, but then you realize that all he has on the island are Siamese cats, which only make me laugh harder in my seat. That is Wes Anderson humor, and it works perfectly for me. His ability to create these challenging characters and put them in situations that I never saw coming (the "pirates" scene being one of them) was outstanding. It felt as if he was throwing his crew into different troubles daily who in turn produced some of the best work ever. Only Wes Anderson could create beauty out of chaos.

My fear of the CGI was muted immediately when I saw that Anderson used the technique to create some of the most imaginative creatures ever to lurk in the sea impressed me. He didn't use it as a central focus of the film (until the end), and used it sporadically so that it really didn't feel as if it was being used. The creatures that he created are so bold and colorful that skillfully he uses them to counter the life of Zissou, which seems be getting darker by the day. This contrast allowed me to see deeper into Murray's character and root for his misadventures throughout the entire film.

Overall, I was very impressed. I know that not many enjoyed this picture as much as his previous works, but for me it was a fresh chapter with a stellar cast. Anderson is slowly changing the face of cinema, and soon others will follow trying to recreate his award winning voice, but will not succeed. This man is in the same boat as Gondry, Coppola, Jonez, and Kaufman. These are the imaginative thinkers of Hollywood that continually break the mold and open the doors to new possibilities.

Grade: ***** out of *****