Asteroid City (2023)

Wes Anderson's latest movie is a tangled mess.  Merely outlining the 'plot' should demonstrate that assessment.  The narrator (Bryan Cranston) states that Conrad Earp (Edward Norton) is a famous playwright.  His latest play, Asteroid City, follows a variety of people who happen to be in Asteroid City for a science competition.  During the festivities, an alien arrives and confiscates the famous asteroid for which the city is named.  A quarantine follows.  Mildly humorous antics follow.  The quarantine is lifted after a week and everyone leaves.  Throughout the play, there are breaks to show behind-the-scenes events or flashbacks to Conrad Earp's creative process, and so on.  To clearly separate these events from the main story, they are shown in black & white.

Augie is a photographer whose wife recently died.  He and his children will be living with his father-in-law (Tom Hanks) for awhile.  Augie's son, Woodrow (Jake Ryan), is part of the science competition.  Midge Campbell (Scarlett Johansson) is a famous actress who views herself as a bad mother; her daughter is another competitor.  There are many other characters, but they are mostly here as background.  As usual for an Anderson film, most of the lines are delivered in something close to a flat monotone.  There is very little emoting.  Based on some of the behind-the-scenes footage and the budding relationship between Augie and Midge, it appears that he is on the mend from his wife's death.  Was that the story?  There was a lot of other stuff here that advanced that plot not in the least.  The playwright claimed the story was about infinity.  I must have missed that aspect.

The movie-play dynamic didn't work.  The set didn't work.  I liked the vibrant visuals, but the silly incomplete overpass was stupid.  I understand that he wants the audience to view this as a play rather than a movie, but that is being too clever by half.  Why do we have background of the play's director's marital issues?  The vending machines that offered virtually anything was amusing, but again beside the point.  It was like a clip show at times.  Oh!  This would be a great bit!  Let's put that in the movie!  Wouldn't it be funny if we had a police chase zip through the town every now and again?  Yeah, let's do that!  Let's do this routine of Augie's car breakdown with Matt Dillon as the mechanic.  Sigh.  Sketch comedy.

Despite a talented cast full of Oscar winners and nominees, this is no better than mediocre.  This is also the first Wes Anderson film in 27 years not to star Bill Murray; maybe that's the problem.  Watch The Grand Budapest Hotel, Fantastic Mr. Fox, Moonrise Kingdom or The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou instead.  Only for the diehard fans of Wes Anderson.