Asteroid City Review | Yes, but still?

For unconditional admirers of Wes Anderson’s cinema, i.e. those who have also enjoyed The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou And The Darjeeling Limited, Asteroid City will be a real treat. They will undoubtedly be among those who will want to see the feature film again very quickly, eager to discover its riches that cannot be revealed so easily on a first viewing.

Those who, on the other hand, liked the cinema of Wes Anderson thanks to his more “accessible” films, Rushmore To The Isle of Dogs Passing by Fantastic Mr Fox, Moonrise Kingdom And The Grand Budapest Hotelwill appreciate for their part the incomparable style of the filmmaker in this new offering, but risk leaving the projection all the same a little perplexed.

With this story set in two different places, delivered by an imposing cast in which certain interpreters play a double role, the approach taken by the filmmaker is rather destabilizing. And comes to hinder the thread of a story whose main axes we seek in vain.

On the one hand, there is this theatrical production that is being mounted in New York which, in this year 1955, is the subject of a great report on television. This show, hosted by an anonymous presenter (played by Bryan Cranston), being of course broadcast in black and white, Wes Anderson thus borrows the tone and television aesthetics of the time to tell this part of his story. We also see interviews with the author Conrad Earp (Edward Norton), the director Schubert Green (Adrien Brody), as well as some actors, including Jones Hall. Played by Jason Schwartzman, the latter embodies in the play Augie Steenbeck, the main character of the play Asteroid City.

too many characters

However, the heart of the film is rather in the cinematographic illustration that we make of this play taking place in the desert of the American Southwest, a fictional place that the playwright Conrad Earp (Edward Norton) invented for his play. The place owes its name to the large crater formed after the fall of a meteorite, which has since become a tourist attraction. With an absurd humor, very tongue-in-cheek, we follow the journey of gifted children, invited to Asteroid City to present their inventions to a delegation of soldiers and astronomers at a time when nuclear tests are taking place right next door. , without anyone caring. Let’s not forget either this visit of an extraterrestrial and its spaceship, forcing the authorities to quarantine the tiny desert town.

One of the young guests being the son of Augie Steenbeck (Schwartzman), the story focuses mainly on the story of this father who, three weeks after the death of his wife, has still not learned the news to his children. His meeting with Midge Campbell (Scarlett Johansson), famous actress whose daughter is also one of the gifted, will be decisive. The story surrounding these two characters could probably have been better developed, but Wes Anderson’s new opus, like The French Dispatch two years ago, suffers from this chronic desire to appeal to an overly imposing cast, with too many characters who, although played by renowned actors, are just passing through. The spectator is thus kept at a distance and must somehow follow a story from which all emotion seems to have been evacuated.

That said, Asteroid City is visually impressive, especially in this part paying homage to the larger-than-life cinema that was being made in the 1950s.

This decor with saturated colors, which is almost like a comic strip, is also nostalgically rich in all the iconic objects of a way of life that today is folklore. The whole thing is inventive, often stunning in terms of the composition of the images, and punctuated with underground gags that make you smile. But that does not prevent the irrepressible desire to say to oneself at the exit: yes, but still?

Launched at the Cannes Film Festival, where it was in the running for the Palme d’OrAsteroid City is currently showing in the original version and in the French version.

Drama

Asteroid City

Wes Anderson

With Jason Schwartzman, Scarlett Johansson, Tom Hanks

1:44
Indoors

6/10