Fox Searchlight sets Wes Anderson’s The French Dispatch for a 2020 release

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

Any year with a new Wes Anderson film is one film fans can look forward to even more, which means you now have more reason than ever to be excited about 2020. It was announced today that after distributing Anderson movies like THE DARJEELING LIMITED, THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL and ISLE OF DOGS, Fox Searchlight has bought the director’s latest movie, THE FRENCH DISPATCH, and will release it sometime next year.

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Anderson’s follow-up to last year’s ISLE OF DOGS (which was nominated for two Oscars, Best Animated Film and Best Original Score), the film is described as “a love letter to journalists set in an outpost of an American newspaper in a fictional 20th-century French city and brings to life a collection of stories published in The French Dispatch magazine.” The main cast includes new faces and some Anderson mainstays alike, such as Benicio Del Toro, Frances McDormand, Jeffrey Wright, Adrien Brody, Timothée Chalamet, Léa Seydoux, Tilda Swinton, Mathieu Amalric, Lyna Khoudri, Stephen Park, Owen Wilson, Lois Smith, and Bill Murray.

“We are excited to dive back into the unmistakable and entirely original world of Wes Anderson,” Steve Gilula and Nancy Utley, chairmen of Fox Searchlight Pictures, said in a statement. “Our collaborations with Wes in the past have been exceptional, and we’re thrilled to be back working with him and the Indian Paintbrush team on The French Dispatch.”

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While the synopsis for the movie seems simple enough to explain, Anderson told Charente Libre in April (via Variety) that the premise is not as easy to explain as it would seem:

The story is not easy to explain. [It’s about an] American journalist based in France [who] creates his magazine. It is more a portrait of this man, of this journalist who fights to write what he wants to write. It’s not a movie about freedom of the press, but when you talk about reporters you also talk about what’s going on in the real world.”

THE FRENCH DISPATCH will be released sometime in 2020, most likely the fall for the sake of awards contention.