Summary:
The adventures of the legendary concierge Gustave H at the famous Grand Budapest Hotel between the first and second World Wars.
My Thoughts:
Wes Anderson is an unequaled cinematic treasure; or at least, that’s how I view him and his work. Anderson is a filmmaker whom plenty of cinephiles adore, but a few find him to be too pretentious. To those who think this film is pretentious, I say ‘bah humbug!’ It’s not pretentious; it’s refined. This is a film for people who love stories, more specifically, people who love books and the relationships we can form with their characters even if we don’t meet them and about longing for a time that we’ve never known.
Though I enjoy all of Anderson’s films, if I’m being honest, I think this is Anderson’s best. As far as story goes, it’s certainly his tightest and most intriguing script, and it has some of the most delightful and well-developed characters, and the charming world that he crafts in this film is one that I love so much I would be willing to live there (quite seriously). I love this film; I love the characters; and I love the humor. It’s simply a marvelous delight to watch.
“Why do you want to be a lobby boy?” “Well, who wouldn’t- at the Grand Budapest, sir. It’s an institution!”
I absolutely love the way this story is framed; it distances us from the story, but it also reminds us how close (emotionally) we can be to those characters. The first and final scenes of this film depict a young boy visiting an author’s memorial to read a book. When the boy visits the memorial he opens the book and begins to read. We then cut to a scene that depicts the aged author (Tom Wilkinson, “The Ghost Writer”) as he paints a scene of himself as a younger author (Jude Law, “eXistenZ”). The Younger Author then tells of a time when he stayed at the Grand Budapest and met Mr. Moustafa (F. Murray Abraham, “Inside Llewyn Davis”) and then proceeded to have dinner with him. When at the dinner, Mr. Moustafa tells the story of when he was a boy that went by the name Zero (Tony Revolori, “Spider-Man: Homecoming”) and how he came to work under Gustave H (Ralph Fiennes, “The Constant Gardener”), a legendary concierge at the Grand Budapest. For people who love stories and dissecting the way they’re told (like myself), I feel the sheer structure has to be a delight (it’s a story inside a story inside a story inside a story).
Another thing I love about this film is how literate it is. I am almost as big of a bibliophile as I am a cinephile, so I tend to gravitate towards films like this anyways. I love the detail-oriented narration, the random bouts of poetry, and the obvious allusions to the history of our own world, but I also love that this world feels wholly self-contained. The characters in this world feel akin to ones we’d find in a Dickens or Dostoyevsky novel; they’re well developed and complex characters with more personality quirks and charm than a whole boatload of Marvel characters.
Wes Anderson is what brings me to this film. I’ll see anything the man does because he’s one of the most unique voices working today. I think almost everyone in Hollywood would agree with that previous statement; just look at the cast he assembled for this film. Practically everyone wants to work with him, and why is that? Because of his voice and aesthetic. Anderson is the definition of an auteur; while it’s obvious he draws inspiration from filmmakers like Ozu (“Tokyo Story”) and Fellini (“Amarcord”), his style is completely original. The way that he frames his shots, the way that he designs his sets, the way that he directs his actors, all of it is meticulously crafted and planned before he sets foot on set, and it shows. If half of Hollywood put as much thought and effort into their films as Anderson we’d be living in a cinematic utopia. Anyways, I’ll stop gushing about how much I love Anderson now…
I think this film has some of the best characters Anderson has crafted (“The Royal Tenenbaums” has some great characters too). I think Gustave H is one of the funniest and most likeable characters Anderson has ever written. I think Dmitri (Adrien Brody, “The Village”) is simultaneously creepy and hilarious, as is Jopling (Willem Dafoe, “At Eternity’s Gate”). There are dozens of other great side characters that populate the world as well, from Ludwig the heavily tattooed prisoner (Harvey Keitel, “Two Evil Eyes”) to Zero’s love interest Agatha (Saoirse Ronan, “Mary Queen of Scots”) to Madame D (Tilda Swinton, “Suspiria (2018)”).
Verdict:
As this is the favorite film of one of my favorite directors it should be no surprise to anyone that I really have nothing bad to say about this film. I’ve said it a dozen and a half times already, but this is a world that evokes so much charm that I would absolutely love to a be a part of it. The ending, which is bittersweet, gives us a sense of nostalgia, a longing to return to the time before things went slightly sour. I’m more than happy to return to this world; I’m always sad I have to leave when the credits roll.
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