Wes Anderson’s Latest delivers the quirks and charm you expect, but lacks the emotional hook of his earlier works
A new Wes Anderson film is to be celebrated. A chance to once again immerse ourselves in his singular blend of stylization and strangely moving storytelling. The Phoenician Scheme, his latest, unsurprisingly doesn’t fall outside his oeuvre. But it charts new terrain, specifically, the fictional Middle Eastern country of Modern Greater Independent Phoenicia, in what amounts to an international caper laced with assassination attempts, family drama, and the question of legacy.
Anatole “Zsa-Zsa” Korda (Benicio del Toro) is a weathered industrialist with a murky past and a complicated present. His latest scheme, a sprawling infrastructure project involving tunnels, waterways, and an ambiguously-defined “hydroelectric embankment”, is on the brink of collapse. Government forces led by Mr. Excalibur (Rupert Friend) aim to bankrupt him by manipulating the market for “bashable rivets and crushed gravel,” and Zsa-Zsa, facing financial and possibly spiritual ruin, turns to the one person he hopes can secure his legacy, his estranged daughter, Liesl (Mia Threapleton).
There are a few problems. One, Liesl is about to become a nun. Two, she believes Zsa-Zsa may have murdered her mother. And three, she’s not exactly impressed by the fact that her father, who has dismissed his nine other sons as unworthy heirs, is only now showing up.
A tenuous reconciliation in place, forged under the promise of uncovering the truth behind the murder, as well as some moral adjustments to the business plan (paying slaves for starters), the pair set off to try and salvage the scheme. Enlisted in this misadventure is Korda’s new tutor Professor Bjorn (Michael Cera), a man whose love for insects is in danger of being surpassed by his growing affections for Liesl.
After the sprawling structure, warmth, nostalgia, and ruminations on life and its meaning in Asteroid City, The Phoenician Scheme feels positively pared down in comparison. A more traditional structure befitting an international caper with an emphasis on more propulsive fun, with the emotional through-line of a broken father-daughter relationship. This heist-like affair sees them criss-crossing the region, making deals, dabbling in blackmail and lectures on insects, and reforging family ties, all while Zsa-Zsa continues to evade the many assassination attempts that have long plagued his life. Scenes and settings serve as playful set pieces, each allowing a series of Anderson regulars (notably a chance to make their mark, most notably as the key investors Marty (Jeffrey Wright), Cousin Hilda (Johansson), Marseille Bob (Mathieu Amalric) and Zsa-Zsa’s brother, Uncle Nubar (Benedict Cumberbatch in full Rasputin mode). There are also newcomers to the troupe, notably Riz Ahmed as a charming Phoenician prince with a gift for diplomacy and layups, and Michael Cera as the delightfully off-beat Swede Bjorn. How it took Anderson this long to work him into a film is beyond me.
Del Toro anchors the film as Zsa-Zsa with, playing him as this quick thinking swindler who is thrown for a loop by his reckoning with mortality and also the accountability served up by his daughter. who is all wounded charm and economic immorality, only starting to grasp the moral weight of his choices. His deadpan delivery and pitch perfect timing is matched by Mia Threapleton. Her Liesl is stoic, conflicted, empathetic, and drolly hilarious. It’s a breakout turn and one that is crucial to the success of this duo that really forms the core of the film.
Visually, the film is everything you expect and more. Adam Stockhausen’s production design and Bruno Delbonnel’s cinematography are intoxicating: arid desert palettes meet 50s/60s kitsch, with surreal afterlife sequences shot in black-and-white. Every frame is packed with detail, but the settings, from opulent-yet-leaking mansions to endless scaffolding, reflect a world quite literally crumbling beneath the weight of ambition.
Anderson’s distinct sense of style is all present, but there’s a slightly darker edge to this outing, one that is lacking in its development. The whimsy is tempered by a steady thread of unease: famine by design, slave labor as a line item, legacies built on suffering. There are sharp jabs at modern oligarchs and the commodification of human lives, as well as a subtle but clear meditation on religion, repentance, and the high cost of redemption. Not just concerning a man who places money over everything, but also the morals of a failed father. The film gestures toward a redemption arc for Zsa-Zsa, and while the final scenes offer a quiet emotional closure, it all feels a little neat given the atrocities committed, the shaky foundations of this father/daughter relationship, and even the castigations of God (Bill Murray) being made apparent during his journey.
Even with this shortfall in terms of emotional heft, The Phoenician Scheme remains a gorgeously constructed, gently absurdist odyssey. One that expansively (but not incisively) touches on legacy, morality, and the danger of building empires without building character. Even as a minor Wes Anderson film, it retains it’s ability to delight and disarm its audience.
The Phoenician Scheme opens on June 6th
