8/22/2021 – R – 1h 29m

Alan: ⭐⭐⭐⭐✩

Alan: The French Dispatch is a movie about a fictional print magazine named The French Dispatch. When I say the movie is about the magazine, I am not being entirely accurate. The movie is not about magazine. In a sense the movie is the fictional magazine. It is an anthology of stories, presented as articles in a magazine, and representing content that might have been, or perhaps was, published in the magazine.

It is important to note that while the magazine is fictional, the movie is quite real even though the movie itself is also the fictional magazine. It is in effect a “true lie” or a “counterfeit fake”.

I am not qualified to write this review.

I love Wes Anderson. I remember the first time I watched one of his movies. I saw Rushmore in a theater in Raleigh, NC and only a few years later I would move to Austin, TX where Anderson is reported to have been from. I never met him, that I know of. I would not have recognized him if I had. I didn’t even know he was from Austin until I started writing this review. Rushmore is a movie about a genius boy who wrote and produced elaborate plays in high school. I remember wishing I could be as competent as the boy. I remember wishing I could be as competent as the filmmaker. I was a filmmaker myself at that time. I supposed I still am although I haven’t made anything in several years. Anderson’s art was brilliant and unique and honestly and little hard to understand. But it held my attention and entertained. I left feeling satisfied even if I didn’t fully know what I had just watched. Bill Murray was excellent in it and he has continued being excellent in many of Anderson’s film projects, including the target of this review.

I don’t think I’m qualified to write this review.

The French Dispatch seems to be about art. And revolution. And food. Although the food is presented as art and the art is presented as revolution. When I say the movie is about art, I’m not being entirely accurate. The movie is a magazine that is about art. That extra layer of reality in its creation makes The French Dispatch a piece of art within itself. Of course, the movie itself is the art of Wes Anderson — and what a beautiful piece of art it is. But within the movie, it is also a self referential piece of art. I do not think the stories it tells are true even within the unreal world that the movie creates. The writers that are represented seem to be unreliable narrators and their stories, published in The French Dispatch and brought to life in The French Dispatch, seem larger than life. They capture the imagination and they capture the eye. I’m not sure they capture the mind — I don’t know what to think of the stories beyond the experience I had viewing them — but I think they may have laid some sort of trap for the mind. At one point the unreality of these stories is lampshaded by… well.. I don’t want to spoil it for you. It will be clear when you see it. But I’m pretty sure I’m right that we are meant to know that these stories are not real. The French Dispatch is a magazine, published in Kansas, about strange and exotic events that occur in France.

I do not believe I am qualified to write this review.

I gave it four stars. It probably deserves five stars, but I think it would be an insult to the filmmaker to presume that my opinion of the creation elevates it to perfection. Indeed the movie is imperfect, but it is perfectly imperfect in the same self-reflective way as the other aspects of the film. It has the sort of imperfection that can convince something they might approach its greatness and inspire them make the attempt at the same time.