Flogging Wes

So I went out this weekend to see The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, which I was intensely curious about, given Wes Anderson's previous films and the very mixed reviews the film has received from practically every quarter. After seeing it, I can understand why they were mixed. Let me just preface this by saying I enjoyed the film immensely, and then follow with a little criticism.

I enjoyed the film immensely.

But it was very unfocused. I wasn't sure, I'm still not sure, what Anderson was trying to say. I'm not sure he knew, either. It was such a mixture of humorous absurdity, tragic absurdity, and over-the-top whimsy that I saw more underlying noise than signal. It felt very personal because of this, as if he were translating both his fascinations and frustrations with life quite directly, more directly than previously, into the film, relatively unfiltered by a unifying structure. That is, it was much more self-indulgent than his previous movies.

What is the Wes Anderson universe? A children's book inhabited by adult characters OR children's-book adults living in an all-too-real world. Probably the former, given the goofiness of the pseudoworld Anderson has his characters romping through. Cate Blanchett's reporter character, 5 months pregnant in the film, says toward the end that, in 12 years, her child will be 11 and a half. "That was my favorite age," Steve Zissou replies. Apparently it's Anderson's, too, a time when his budding, precocious intellect found much fascinating but had not yet learned the sadness that infuses so much of his work.

Speaking of which... What the hell is with Steve Zissou? Emblematic of Anderson's character problems in this movie, Zissou's character is curiously one-dimensional. He spends most of the film wallowing in an antisocial depression whose superficial causes/manifestations are made clear but whose backhistory is never sufficiently explored. This prevents the the audience from developing any kind of understanding of or sympathy toward Zissou, even though one might normally be drawn toward his underdog status. Having said that, Murray does a good job with what he has to work with, throwing enough humor into his character to keep him from being a complete wet noodle.

At this point, I'd like to mention an interesting observation my fiancee made about Zissou and his relationship to Ned. She saw in their dynamic a reenactment of the Christ story, from a decidedly cynical perspective. Ned, who may or may not be the real son of Zissou, nonetheless follows his remote, unloving "father" on his mad quest, sacrificing first his money and ultimately his life for an ideal dad who doesn't actually exist. Christ, from the perspective of a cynical realist who nonetheless thinks there might be something to this God thing, may or may not have been the "real" son of God. God, if we look at the Old Testament, wasn't always the nicest dude. He was jealous, short-tempered, and frequently nastier to his followers than he was to their enemies. Nonetheless, in the name of universal lovingkindness, Christ embraced the concept of Yahweh, transforming him into a loving, forgiving God. He ultimately paid for it with his life. Both Zissou and God, it might be said, were softened by this unwarranted sacrifice. (Ok, please don't comment about all the nasty things Christians have said and done in the name of God. I'm well aware. It's the concept of God I'm talking about, people!)

Anyway, weak characterization is a problem with practically all the characters in the movie. Unlike previous Anderson films, they are not very remarkable in themselves, one-trick ponies who are amusing enough onscreen, but who fail to linger in the imagination the way practically all the characters from Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums did.

But again, in spite of all this criticism, the movie clicked for me. I liked it. I thought it was funny, I felt bad during the parts I was supposed to feel bad in, and I kept, I think, a head for the absurdity, unlike some of my fellow moviegoers, who stopped laughing as much as the film went on. Maybe they were bored, or maybe they were distracted by the admittedly heavy dose of melancholy running through the movie, or maybe I'm just insensitive. I don't know. Maybe you just have to have that precocious 11.5-year-old inside you still, waiting to be both fascinated and appalled by the adult world, to really enjoy this movie. But whatever structural flaws the film had, the feeling I have about it is still positive, and I would gladly watch it again to see whether my first impressions about the structural stuff are borne out on repeated viewings.