Jordan Mattox

Sadly, I missed seeing this in theaters. It’s as beautiful as any of Wes Anderson’s films, but I found the through line of the plot lacking–which I suppose may be a criticism that you could lodge at a number of his films. The film is really just series of beautifully constructed vignettes. Not in my top tier of Wes Anderson’s films, but I will likely watch it again to absorb the palette and find the, likely, many things I missed.

I pulled this one from Scott Sumner’s amazing lists and reviews. It may be one of the, if not the, greatest war film ever made. It oscillates between strange and horrifying, which is likely a more accurate picture of what WWII was like for combatants and non-combatants alike. The film takes place in Belarus as the Nazis move through it to Russia and shows how, in graphic reconstructions, they decimated hundreds of towns. Horrifying to watch, but, given how little exposure Americans have to what happened on the Eastern Front, important nonetheless.

I really enjoyed this strange little film. Aside from the prologue of Wallace Shawn’s character walking to the restaurant and the ending with him in a cab, the film is essentially a record of a conversation between two friends who haven’t seen each other in years. While their conversation is winding and discursive, the subject is essentially about how the find meaning in their lives. As boring as this sounds as a logline for a movie, I was mesmerized. Highly recommended.