I'm not in a very good writing mood. But I promised last time that I'll return with a good movie. And since there are already around three weeks since I've seen "Moonrise Kingdom", maybe it's the case to make an entry about it until my memory loses it completely.
The movie is a comedy. A pretty particular one as style. I guess it's something specific for Wes Anderson (the director) although I've only seen "Fantastic Mr. Fox" as another title on which he worked on. Actually .. if I remember well I've also seen "The Life Aquatic", but it was too long ago to remember more than it didn't impress me at all. Coming back to the current movie, and leaving the style analysis for later, the subject is set somewhere on a 3-digits number population island, close to the NE U.S. coast, and the time is somewhere in the '60s. As main characters we have two children, a boy and a girl around 12 years old. He is an orphan sent by the foster family in scouts camp (where his colleagues do not accept him very well), she is a bit out of her age's normality (sufficiently to be "cast out" of the "normality" of her family). What results from all this context is a sort of infantile "love story" manifested through a run of the two kids "far from the surrounding mean world". Where "far" = in the island woods, in a moment when a hurricane is coming and it's about to sweep everything in its pathway. All this situation alarms the parents of the girl (Bill Murray & Frances McDormand), the local sheriff (Bruce Willis) and the scout camp's chief master scout (Edward Norton). I'll leave the viewer to discover what happens next + the rest of the details and I'll get back to the style ..
If you've seen "The Fantastic Mr. Fox" and you liked it, you'll probably like also "Moonrise Kingdom". In my opinion is a bit lower as level. But is the same combination of dry but styled context and situation humor, which is somehow also warm - at least if you're watching the whole ensemble. It is something totally different from a normal comedy (like "Ted" or "Horrible Bosses" which come into my mind now, and on which I laughed sufficiently enough, but also which are in a completely different subgenre). In a way Wes Anderson looks to me quite close to Alexander Payne ("Sideways", "The Descendants") but with less drama. And also maybe a bit .. weird in some parts. For instance, in the current case, there are a couple of scenes which may seem taken a bit too far given the exact precised young age of the characters. This may have been avoided (and result in something as good as a final product and a larger appreciation from the public, especially if you give a look at the IMDb boards ..). But, if you have some brain to get, eyes to see and ears to hear the rest of the 95% of the film .. you realize that the small pieces don't matter that much ...
Talking about eyes and ears, let me close with the cinematography + the soundtrack. You have an opening scene that tells you clearly that what follows is not average stuff. And I actually can say that's the best technically worked movie that I've seen this year. It doesn't make sense to describe in words how the visual frames are composed. If you have some leaning at least towards photography, than what's being served to you visually really deserves to keep your eyes wide open. Is not about the effects, nor the location setting. Is just a demonstration of how nice a movie taking place in a normal setting can be done. The cinematographer (Robert Yeoman) is totally unknown for me, but I have to remember him for the future. The soundtrack managed to change my opinion on Alexandre Desplat as an overrated composer. I'll resume only at saying that it's probably his best soundtrack I've heard up to this moment, and I'll pass to clips that should be more eloquent than my blah-blah.
Rating: 5 out of 5
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