The French Dispatch – Film Review

Wes Anderson‘s newest film The French Dispatch brings to life a collection of stories from the final issue of an American magazine published in a fictional 20th-century French city.

When it comes to filmmaker Wes Anderson, you have to go into each of his movies knowing full well that it’s not going to be for everyone, particularly not for mainstream audiences. So if you like colossal movies where something riveting happens in every other scene, then none of Anderson’s movies are going to be your cup of tea. It’s as simple as that. He has an extreme style and flair in each of his projects to the point where we can now recognize a Wes Anderson movie without even having to know it’s one.

His films tend to have beautiful cinematography, use a lot of colors on the palette, and shove a bunch of crazy imagery right in your face whether you like it or not. My favorite film of his to this day is The Grand Budapest Hotel which is a staggeringly gorgeous, interesting, and oftentimes hilarious piece of art. The French Dispatch is the most Wes Anderson film of his career. It’s genuinely a bit too much at times. There are some scenes that will leave you scratching your head, and others will keep your eyes glued to the screen in complete fascination because this film proves that there is no other filmmaker out there that directs the same way he does, for better and for worse.

The film takes a bit of time to get going, starting off surprisingly slow for an Anderson film. We’re not really too sure what’s going on for about twenty minutes or so, but once that first stretch is over and done with, the rest of the film in front of you is sure to intrigue you even if just a little bit. Anderson truly went all out with this one. There are tons of jokes here that are superb, all of the imagery is staggering, and the editing is practically seamless, jumping from one starkly different scene to the next without ever feeling jarring.

And of course, the cast is absolutely stacked and includes the likes of Benicio del Toro, Adrien Brody, Tilda Swinton, and Léa Seydoux just to name a select few. Even Willem Dafoe and Saoirse Ronan show up albeit very briefly. Each actor involved in this film brought their A-game and delivered memorable performances, even if some of them get outrageously outshined by others due to more screen-time.

The French Dispatch will only be enjoyed if you are a fan of Wes Anderson and his work, and that’s totally fine. You just have to know beforehand that, if you are not a fan of his style and flair at this point, then this film is most definitely not going to make you convert into a fan. If anything, it’ll make you dislike his movies more. However, as a fan of his, I thoroughly enjoyed this gorgeously bizarre movie, even if not everything fell into place as smoothly as his other projects.