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As a writer and director, Wes Anderson has definitely created his own unique style. From the dialogue to the color palette to the way the actors carry themselves and deliver their lines, everything about his films is instantly recognizable as a Wes Anderson film. And that style fits perfectly with his out-of-this-world ‘50s adventure, Asteroid City.
Asteroid City explores the story behind a popular stage production, which finds a group of Junior Stargazers and their families arriving in a tiny desert town for a convention. War photographer Augie (Jason Schwartzman) arrives with his four children, who don’t yet know that their mother has died. He soon strikes up a friendship with actress Midge (Scarlett Johansson), who’s preparing for an upcoming role. But the convention is disrupted by the arrival of an alien, who takes the town’s famed asteroid before quickly flying off, leaving the tiny town in chaos.
As scientists and government officials work with the gathered crowd to try to figure out what’s happened and how to properly cover it up, everyone is held at the town’s motor lodge, waiting to be allowed to leave. As is generally the case for Anderson’s films, the cast is a motley group of quirky characters who are thrown together in this unlikely situation. And the fact that it’s a story within a story—and, from time to time, Anderson takes a step back to explore the story behind the play and its production—adds an additional level of complexity and quirkiness.
Like the director’s other films, it’s all a little strange and more than slightly kooky. The characters and their stories are definitely eccentric. And the style is unmistakably Anderson’s. After a couple of somewhat perplexing films (or at least more perplexing than usual), this one tells an interesting and playfully odd story. And though viewers will still most likely walk away from it wondering what it was all about, that’s par for the course for this distinctive director. And it won’t really detract from the audience’s general enjoyment of this colorfully, cleverly quirky sci-fi comedy.
Of course, if Anderson’s films just aren’t your style, this one won’t win you over. It features the same eccentric characters, the same kind of silly story, and the same snappy dialogue. But if you love the director but felt like he’d gone off the rails a bit in the last couple of releases, you’ll be happy to see him back to his old ways here.
You can join in the wacky fun when Asteroid City arrives in theaters on June 23, 2023.
Listen to the review on Reel Discovery:
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