In the past few weeks, a number of friends and correspondents told me how much they were looking forward to the new Wes Anderson flick. I would reply by asking how many of them saw Asteroid City. Not a one of them had. Most hadn’t even heard of it.
In a sane and rational world, Asteroid City would’ve been the end of Wes Anderson as we knew him. That was the moment when Anderson completely disappeared up his own ass. His signature quirks had finally swallowed him whole and shit out an incoherent self-serving candy-colored abomination too bloated and malformed to live. I had expected us to banish Anderson to obscurity like we did with Cameron Crowe after Aloha.
As far as I’m concerned, Anderson was starting from less than zero with The Phoenician Scheme. The man had to prove that he was still worth his reputation, still capable of telling a good story, and not just a pack of gimmicks past their expiration date. Imagine my astonished relief to find the movie is legitimately good.
Benicio del Toro stars as Anatole “Zsa-Zsa” Korda, a deranged billionaire who has somehow maintained his enormous fortune despite all political/economic/criminal interference. (His opponents are primarily embodied by Rupert Friend’s character, code-named “Excalibur”.) We pick up shortly before Korda narrowly survives yet another assassination attempt, prompting him to formally designate an heir. Trouble is, his nine sons — all either adopted or borne from one of three deceased mothers — are all pre-teens.
Enter Sister Liesl (Mia Threapleton, daughter to Kate Winslet, in what will surely be her breakout role), Korda’s firstborn and only daughter. Unfortunately, the two haven’t been on speaking terms since her mother died, allegedly at the hands of Korda himself. What’s more, Korda decided to keep any potential boyfriends away by sending Liesl to a convent at five years old, with the unintended consequence that she grew up a devout Catholic and an aspiring nun.
The upshot is that Liesl hates her father and wants nothing to do with him or any of his business. But she plays along anyway, in the hope that she might get some closure for herself and better care for her little brothers. Thus Liesl is brought into her father’s affairs — specifically his upcoming magnum opus — which brings us to the eponymous Phoenician Scheme.
The film goes into excessive detail about the contrived details and intricate moving pieces, but the basic gist is that Korda is trying to build a network of tunnels and trains and waterways all over northern Africa, which will in turn make himself and everyone else involved fabulously wealthy for decades to come. Naturally, slave labor will be involved in the construction thereof, and Korda has gone to great lengths in starving the region to make this plan viable. Hence the aforementioned and ongoing attempts to stall and/or kill him.
Even with all of that, Korda is primarily concerned with “The Gap”. He doesn’t have the funds or resources to completely finish the project. Thus the second act is as follows.
- Korda goes to visit an old acquaintance and/or business associate, asking to raise the necessary capital.
- The associate accuses Korda of trying to pull a fast one.
- There’s a shouting match. There are shenanigans.
- Rinse and repeat.
To get this out of the way, the classic Wes Anderson forced quirkiness is here and in full effect. There’s a business dispute that’s inexplicably settled by a basketball contest. There’s a running joke involving hand grenades. There’s a climax that serves no purpose except to definitively prove there is no place for a fight sequence in a Wes Anderson picture.
And of course we can’t forget all the diorama sets and rigidly micromanaged shots. The artistry on display is impeccable as ever, and it goes a long way to selling Anderson’s unique brand of outlandish whimsy. Unfortunately, this comes with a holdover from Asteroid City: A surreal black-and-white framing device comprised of scenes that directly comment on the actual plot. The good news is that this time, it works.
See, we don’t get some half-baked meta commentary or a film-within-a-film this time. The basic gist is that every time Korda comes near death — which happens a lot in this movie, the constant assassination attempts are a running gag — Korda gets a glimpse of the afterlife. He gets a vision of his life and how it will be viewed by those in Heaven. (Complete with Bill Murray playing God, which is exactly as funny as it sounds.) There’s a plot-motivated method to this particular madness, serving to illustrate Korda’s character development and specifically his struggles with his own mortality and morality.
Because this is a Wes Anderson picture, of course we get a parade of A-list actors turning in speaking cameos with deadpan delivery. There are really only three characters here worth discussing in any detail. First of them is Michael Cera, here playing a comic relief entomologist who gets press-ganged into acting as Korda’s secretary.
He’s also a potential love interest for Liesl. To repeat, Michael Cera is playing a love interest for a nun in a Wes Anderson movie. That’s exactly as comically awkward as it sounds.
Speaking of which, it’s the Liesl/Korda interplay that’s by far the most compelling reason to see this movie. For all it’s whimsical quirkiness and convoluted political/economical skullduggery, this is very much a father/daughter story. We’ve got a devoutly Christian and idealistic young woman opposite an old man steeped in every possible sin, and the two of them learn from each other in sweetly surprising ways.
Liesl wants to be a nun, but it never crosses her mind that maybe the sisterhood doesn’t want her. Maybe the church isn’t where she’s most needed. More to the point, it’s worth asking if she would give up her vows and leave the church if it meant getting her father back. Would she make that deal if her father reformed? If he did it for her?
As for Korda, he’s an old man who’s only narrowly survived a number of assassination attempts. For all his bluster about how safe he is, it’s patently clear that Korda is only growing more aware of his own mortality. Does he really want to spend the rest of his years as a criminal, looking over his shoulder all the time? Does he want slavery and famine to be the sum total of his legacy? If he can’t be a good father and be criminally wealthy (and it’s been firmly proven that he can’t have both), which will he choose?
Overall, The Phoenician Scheme is a welcome return to form for Wes Anderson. I was greatly relieved to see his brand of hamfisted whimsy as a distinctive means to flavor the overall story and not as an end in itself. Yes, there are a few times when Anderson oversteps his boundaries — that action scene at the climax was pathetically useless, and that basketball scene had no business being there — but I can respect a filmmaker who’s still trying to push his boundaries and try new things at this phase in a long and accomplished career. And the course-correction after Asteroid City is a highly promising sign.
For all its bells and whistles, this is a sweet little father/daughter tale made with sincere heart, crafted with painstaking care. The presentation may be complex, but the scheme itself is simple enough to track. I’m happy to sign off on this.
Congratulations and thank you, Mr. Anderson, you’ve made up for Asteroid City. Don’t let it happen again.