Stylistic directors have always been a staple of the film industry. The ability to tell a story in an accessible, yet thought provoking, way has been sought out by film studios and audiences all over the world. Some of the most iconic movies are only iconic because of the choices that the directors make to ensure that their personal touch can be seen throughout the movie. Some choices that are more subtle than others, like Martin Scorsese’s untouchable dialogue and character development, and others are more upfront, like Quentin Tarentino’s particular flourish for dramatic violence and dark comedy. But overall, most directors stick to one medium through which they tell their stories. However, for visionary director and auteur Wes Anderson, one medium is not quite enough to capture the stories and style that continues to dazzle the eyes of audiences around the globe.
Anderson’s movies all share a distinctly curated art style, one that presents itself beautifully through both stop motion and live action, two mediums that highlight different aspects of his infamous auter’s touch. Two movies that accentuate this contrast beautifully are the critically acclaimed stop motion animated Fantastic Mr. Fox, and the equally brilliant live action tale of The Grand Budapest Hotel. Both films bring out the best in Wes Anderson’s eccentric approach to filmmaking, while still staying conceptually distinct and highlighting different stylistic characteristics.
In order to understand the different ways the two movies accentuate different features of Wes Anderson’s directing expertise we must first understand the stylistic patterns that exist within all of his major films. The most notable, and generally universal feature of his directing is his deliberately self-aware composition. Anderson once described this phenomenon, saying “For me, often what might take somebody out of it is what I think is just the most beautiful thing” (Wes Anderson Collection, 132). When most filmmakers go about staging a scene, they try to blend unique shots with camera angles that will attract the audience away from the fact that they are watching a movie. But Wes Anderson deliberately goes against this filmmaking staple and tries to attract as much attention to the curated feel that so many directors try to avoid. The outcome of this is an interesting interaction with his film’s sense of verisimilitude, where as an audience member you appreciate the film for being so finely designed, and yet you still feel a suspended sense of disbelief. A clear example of this exists in almost every shot in every one of his movies, namely the fact that whoever a scene is meant to focus on is always centered within the bounds of the camera. No matter what plot development is being presented, or what monochromatic color scheme is filling the screen, you can always count on the focus being directly in the middle of the screen. This helps to ground the audience and keep them from being lost amidst the “static, densely packed, [and] fussily composed” composition (Scott, 2014). Speaking of “densely packed” the second most recognizable aspect of Wes Anderson’s style is his extremely meticulous attention to detail. Every one of his scenes is filled with characters and objects that add to the surreal, almost dreamlike feeling that his films elicit. A great example of this attention to curation comes from The Grand Budapest Hotel, in the courtroom scene. This scene is lit by two candlebraums located symmetrically on either side of the shot, which is mostly taken up by Deputy Kovacs (played by Jeff Goldblum) standing at an elaborate wooden table built from what appear to be many deer antlers coming together to form the legs. Furthermore, behind Deputy Kovacs is a large, monochromatic painting of a boar, and off to either side of him is a piano and an upright taxidermied bear. This scene only lasts for about 4 minutes, but the vast amount of attention to otherwise minuscule details makes the scene feel distinctly crafted and therefore more significant.
Anderson’s eye for self-aware composition can also be seen through the extensive use of planimetric composition in his movies. Planimetric composition is a particular style of set composition that structures the different elements of the mise en scène within different planes relative to the camera. A great example of this is the first scene in Fantastic Mr. Fox, where three distinct planes represent the foreground, middle and background parts of the setting. Most of Wes Anderson’s scenes are structured in a similar way. The first plane is occupied by small bushes and the foxes themselves, while the second contains the rolling fields that make up the majority of the setting, and the third contains taller, more distant, hills. This may seem like a typical description of an establishing shot, but it differs in a few important ways. The first is that all elements within a certain plane typically only interact with each other, which makes the sets feel rigid and more clearly staged. Once again, this is a compositional style that other directors typically try to avoid in order to make their films feel more dynamic and ultimately realistic. But Anderson stays true to form, purposefully trying to draw the audience’s attention to the staged feeling his movies promote. This also adds to the same surreal feeling mentioned earlier, as the audience sees a similar version of reality that is intentionally meant to appear curated.
So now that the significant aspects of Anderson’s style have been established, the question of medium arises once again. The majority of Anderson’s films are live action, his first animated film being Fantastic Mr. Fox, released in 2009. Until then, Anderson’s live action characters were seen “often [moving] like stop-motion figures through landscapes that resemble drawings and models more than real places.” (Scott, 2009). Even in his live action films, Anderson’s style still resembles that of a stop motion film, with characters making very deliberate movements through a scene’s planes while exhibiting bright, resplendent colors that resemble fiction much more than reality. So Fantastic Mr. Fox was like a return to form for Wes Anderson, even though he had never made a stop motion animated film to begin with. His deliberately curated set design felt right at home in a medium that couldn’t help but be intentionally designed. Instead of designing costumes to fit the actors, he could instead design entire characters to fit his image of the fox and his group of bipedal animal friends. Animation inherently gives the director more creative control over the style of their movie, and for Wes Anderson this meant an abundance of new style choices. The first thing most people notice when watching Fantastic Mr. Fox is the specific way that the fur on the characters bristles and sways, almost “as if they are standing in front of the world’s weakest wind tunnel” (Bradshaw, 2009). This would be unfamiliar to audiences in 2009, but this particular “design choice” is actually a staple of early stop motion animated films. Real animal hair used to be very common in stop motion, and its use resulted in the characters fur adjusting slightly as the animators repositioned them for each frame. Anderson was a big fan of the 1930s stop motion film Roman de Renard, which was also based on a Roald Dahl book. Real animal hair used to be very common in stop motion, and its use resulted in the characters fur adjusting slightly as the animators repositioned them for each frame. Anderson was a big fan of the 1930s stop motion film Roman de Renard, which was also based on a Roald Dahl book and had the same windswept bristling effect that Anderson recreated in Fantastic Mr. Fox. (Sancton, 2009). He insisted on incorporating real fur into the creation of the puppets instead of sculpted fur, which is “more typical for stop-motion puppets” (Sancton, 2009). Design choices like this show how animation allows Anderson to fully explore his creative bounds with control over everything, down to the slight movement of Mr. Fox’s fantastic fur.
Yet despite the more “hands-on” artistic touches that Anderson incorporates into his animated films, there is nothing quite like seeing a real actor performing on screen. This is doubly true when the actors are performing on sets and in scenes that feel like they were taken out of a waking fever dream full of poignant dialogue and striking colors. Fantastic Mr. Fox was criticized for having “jerky movements and porcelain eyes … like [an] old-fashioned wind-up toy uneasily sharing the shelf with the latest video game platform” (Scott, 2009). Real actors, on the other hand, are only victim to their own performances, something that Anderson hardly has to worry about when dealing with an array of A-list actors. Furthermore, the equally lavish sets and locations add to the allure of Anderson’s films. Miniature models of hills and tunnels have their charm, but giant hotels and cascading mountains are another sight to behold entirely. The Grand Budapest Hotel is a great example of live action action intertwining with Anderson’s affinity for genuine human emotion. The movie is filled with subtle expressions and nuanced dialogue that creates a feeling of empathy that easily surpasses the “jerky movements” and “stiff figurines” from Fantastic Mr. Fox (Scott, 2009). It is also important to note that the issue of emotion in animation was somewhat resolved in Anderson’s 2018 animated film Isle of Dogs, which doubled down on the emotion and transformed its lifeless puppets into “deep repositories of soul” (Chang, 2018).
But aside from the skill of hand animators, Wes Anderson uses all of the tools at his disposal to ensure that his films feel like something from a completely different world. While his animated films are transformed into truly exceptional works of hand animation, his live action films combine realism with surrealism to create a new experience entirely. A clear demonstration of this is present in most reviews of The Grand Budapest Hotel, where the film is described with phrases like “a filigreed toy box” and “artisanal magic” (Rolling stone and NYT). The film is described as being above reality, with a heightened sense of wonder and mystery. This all seems very appropriate for such a movie, but it stands out even more when you consider the reviews of Anderson’s stop-motion films. They are also described with an equal sense of wonder, but this feeling is largely attributed to the animation rather than Anderson’s artistic touch. The New York Times exemplified this in its review of Fantastic Mr. Fox by calling it “in some ways his most fully realized and satisfying film” and then going on to compliment the director of animation and everyone else involved in the movie except for Anderson himself. On the other hand, for Anderson’s live-action films, the New York Times accurately credits him with the ability to make his characters “move like stop-motion figures through landscapes that resemble drawings and models more than real places.” His ability to use practical effects, like the ironic miniature model of the so-called “Grand” Budapest Hotel used in the film’s establishing shots, gives an illusory effect to the entire experience, making it appear uncannily magnificent.
So when it comes to overall individuality, Anderson’s live-action films have a slight edge, due to his ability to combine realism and surrealism with grace and finesse.
Comparing the medium of Wes Anderson’s films is largely a semantic debate, as each of his films to date has proven to be distinctly innovative in one way or another. Anderson is always looking to take his formula and push it one step further, whether it comes in the form of real animal fur in Fantastic Mr. Fox, or the practical effects used to glorify The Grand Budapest Hotel. Each form of storytelling has its own strengths, and there are very few negatives to Anderson’s use of either live action or stop motion. Even the seemingly outdated puppets from Fantastic Mr. Fox bring their own stilted charm within the film’s stylistic design. Wes Anderson is a perfect modern day example of the auteur and shows how superb stylistic consistency across mediums reveals the defining characteristics of the mediums themselves.
Bibliography
Chang, Justin. “Review: Wes Anderson’s ‘Isle of Dogs’ Is Often Captivating, but Cultural Sensitivity Gets Lost in Translation.” Los Angeles Times, 2 Mar. 2018, https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-isle-of-dogs-review-20180321-story.html.
Peter, Bradshaw. “Film Review: Fantastic Mr Fox.” The Guardian, 22 Oct. 2009, http://www.theguardian.com/film/2009/oct/22/fantastic-mr-fox-review.
Sancton, Julian. “How the Puppets from Fantastic Mr. Fox Were Made.” Vanity Fair, 13 Nov. 2009,https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2009/11/how-the-puppets-from-fantastic-m-fox- were-made-slideshow.
Scott, A. O. “Bittersweet Chocolate on the Pillow.” The New York Times, 6 Mar. 2014. NYTimes.com, https://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/07/movies/wes-andersons-grand-budapest-hotel-is-a-complex-caper.html.
Scott, A. O. “Don’t Count Your Chickens.” The New York Times, 12 Nov. 2009. NYTimes.com, https://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/13/movies/13fantastic.html.
Seitz, Anderson. The Wes Anderson Collection. Abrams, 2013.
Seitz, Matt Zoller, et al. The Grand Budapest Hotel: The Wes Anderson Collection. 2015. Open WorldCat, https://public.ebookcentral.proquest.com/choice/publicfullrecord.aspx?p=5118925.
Travers, Peter. “The Grand Budapest Hotel.” Rolling Stone, 6 Mar. 2014, https://www.rollingstone.com/movies/movie-reviews/the-grand-budapest-hotel-92777/.