Wes Anderson is an acquired taste. If you don’t like your comedy dry and quirky, you probably aren’t a fan for his irreverent brand of white people problems. I love his films but have yet to be wowed since THE ROYAL TENENBAUMS. Yes, the movies are fun but they are also almost identical to one another. THE LIFE AQUATIC seemed like it was aping TENENBAUMS, but after that they all barely varied from the same format. MOONRISE KINGDOM pulled away a little bit and was his best film in years.
According to the LA Times, Anderson’s next film may be his biggest departure yet. GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL is getting ready to begin filming in Germany soon, and Anderson shed some light on the project.
“Uuuuum … it’s a … as you might gather from the title, a hotel figures prominently in it,” says Anderson, who’s not exactly a chatterbox when it comes to talking about upcoming work. “And it mostly takes place about 85 years ago.” Good. (Long pause.) Please. Go on. “And it’s kind of European … a bit inspired partly by Hollywood Europe, and also by some European writers around that time. Yeah. That’s a little bit about it. Kind of vague, but …”
Anderson specifically cites the movies TO BE OR NOT TO BE from director Carl Lubitsch and SHOP AROUND THE CORNER from Billy Wilder as his influences for the movie. Both directors are masters of classic Hollywood. This could mean that Anderson is going for a similar visual style as those films or could be trying for something more like the classic brand of comedy from that era. I am certainly open to seeing Anderson try something new, but I also don’t want to see him shoe-horn in another film style just for shits and giggles.