HIJINKS AND HUMOUR AND HAND-GRENADES, OH MY!
It was a chilly Friday night in Melbourne when, dressed in my shabbiest woollen jacket, I stepped from the biting wind into a small cinema lobby, proving that the cinema is often a good escape in more ways than one. And someone who knows all about cinematic escapism is Wes Anderson.
- SPOILERS FOLLOW -
I knew nothing about The Phoenician Scheme when I booked the tickets — and that’s how I like it. I tend to avoid trailers for most films nowadays and with Anderson’s in particular, feel relatively certain that entertainment and eye-candy are in store.
That signature style was evident from moment the film began, as a meticulously styled Benicio del Toro sits in a luxurious and retro light-aircraft cabin — before it explodes, setting the tone for a story filled with bombs, guns, poison, and grenades.
The Phoenician Scheme is categorised as an ‘espionage, dark comedy’ which neglects the family-drama part that arguably forms the core of the film. The plot centers on Zsa-Zsa Korda, a ruthless billionaire arms dealer portrayed by del Toro who, after surviving his sixth plane crash embarks on a path of redemption, though inadvertently. While attempting to create a legacy through ruthlessly executed infrastructure projects in the fictional Middle Eastern ‘Phoenicia’ (which bears no relation to the ancient Phoenicia), the brazen, heartless Korda summons his estranged daughter Liesl, a nun-in-training, to give her a ‘trial run’ as his potential heir — a wise move, seeing as he spends most of his life avoiding assassination attempts and sabotage.
The plan is for her to inherit and carry on his ambitions if he meets a sticky end, but first the pair embark on a journey, meeting with all the stakeholders and reconciling on the way. Liesl’s ideological bent slowly erodes while Korda confronts his moral blind spots, and the pair make a wonderfully coordinated value flip as Anderson guides us through delicious and bizarre locales and encounters, all inhabited by a star-studded cast including Michael Cera, Tom Hanks, Scarlett Johansson, and Benedict Cumberbatch.
It’s impressive how Anderson recruits familiar archetypes and then injects fresh life into them with whimsical, absurdist qualities. Tropes like the stuffy admiral, the communist freedom-fighter, the Arabian prince, and the old mother superior all make appearances. However, under Anderson’s hand these cutout tropes are all subverted. The radical politely and cheerfully acquiesces to reason, the old business magnate playfully joins an impromptu basketball game, and the mother superior displays corruption in service of piety. It’s all an exercise in creative unpredictability.
Another hallmark of Anderson's storytelling is the way characters reveal their backstories through monologues. In most films, this approach would feel forced or corny, often relegated to clichéd "hero hears a villain monologuing" scenarios. But Anderson's reality is so heightened and the characters so often devoid of normal human emotion, that these monologues serve as essential windows into their inner worlds, providing the audience with the necessary depth to understand and connect.
Anderson recruits familiar archetypes and then injects fresh life into them with whimsical, absurdist qualities.
By this point in time, Anderson’s style is fully developed and realized. He knows what he's about, and so does his audience. There's a lot to be said for a well-established, trademarked look and feel. But there's also a downside. It's very opinionated. You either get it or you don't — a point illustrated when the young couple beside me in the cinema got up and left two-thirds of the way through, or by the lady to my other side who shot me a baffled look as the final credits rolled, as if trying to divine just how bamboozled I was.
Still, few of us can hope to be as recognizable and confident in our craft as Anderson, and whether or not his movies hit home, I often leave with a glow of inspiration and a drive to make something new. This time was no exception. As I walked out of the warm cinema into that cold air again, I will admit to feeling confident. I've been closing in on a manuscript in the last few months, but sometimes it seems too big to handle. This film was a reminder that its always possible to prise oneself out of a funk, and that to navigate the difficulties of life, sometimes all we need is a little comedy and whimsy, and the confidence to see it through.
Jim :)