OVER 25 years into his film-making career, Wes Anderson is well-established as a ‘Marmite’ director: you either like his heavily stylised, ensemble cast-loaded, deadpan shtick, or you really, really don’t.
Those in the latter camp are unlikely to be converted by his latest offering, which is presented as a 1960s-style ‘television special’ about celebrated playwright Conrad Earp (Edward Norton), introduced and occasionally narrated by a host played by Bryan Cranston.
The special – and thus the film itself – is a dual-strand affair based around a TV adaptation of Earp’s best-known work, Asteroid City, a comedic drama centred on an eclectic collection of people caught up in a UFO landing at the height of the Atomic Age in 1955 while visiting a tiny desert town named for its ancient meteor crater.
The town is hosting a ‘Junior Stargazers and Space Cadets Convention’ but, in true Wes Anderson, kids-as-adults style, these young astro-enthusiasts are no ordinary geeks: one has created their very own rocket-propelled jetpack, while another has perfected a fully functional anti-matter ray.
Conventioneers calmly sip coffee and eat flapjacks at the local diner as atomic mushroom clouds erupt at nearby A-bomb test sites: war photographer Augie Steenbeck (Anderson regular Jason Schwartzman) nonchalantly snaps a picture of one as it blooms and unfurls.
So far, so Wes Anderson.
The recently widowed pipe-smoking camera jockey is there with his three mischievous young daughters and teenage genius son, Woodrow (Jake Ryan), nicknamed ‘Brainiac’. The latter is to receive an award at the convention, but the family’s ultimate destination was to be the luxurious home of Augie’s cranky father-in-law, Stanley (Tom Hanks), with whom he has never quite hit it off.
Events conspire to lure Stanley to Asteroid City, where other visitors include troubled Hollywood star Midge Campbell (Scarlett Johansson) and her teenage daughter Dinah (Grace Edwards), a coterie of musical cowboys led by the affable Montana (Rupert Friend) and featuring Britpop icon Jarvis Cocker on washboard (Cocker also performs the movie’s theme song), five-star US Army General Grif Gibson (Jeffrey Wright) and top astronomer Dr Hickenlooper (Tilda Swinton).
Oh, and there’s also a roadrunner who occasionally turns up to deliver a signature ‘meep-meep’ and underscore some of the more cartoonish elements at play.
All (except the roadrunner) are staying at the town’s ‘motor court’ run by an ultra-attentive proprietor played by Steve Carell, where everything from sweets and cigarettes to ready-mixed Martinis and plots of desert property can be purchased from the vending machines for a handful of quarters.
Following an alien visitation – a superb, visually arresting sequence – the town is quarantined, with the ensuing enforced proximity kindling romance between certain characters. Before long, everyone stuck in Asteroid City is gradually going stir crazy (echoes of the Covid lockdowns abound here) as they’re forced to contemplate this historic event and their own existence.
“I didn’t like the way that guy looked at us, the alien – like maybe we’re doomed,” grumbles Augie of the ET interloper.
"Maybe we are," responds the prone-to-existentialism Midge.
However, perhaps in keeping with the optimistic outlook of the era depicted, most of the others take a more positive view.
The TV play unfolds in vivid vintage Kodachrome-hued widescreen, interspersed with dramatic recreations of the original stage play’s turbulent journey from Earp’s typewriter to off-Broadway theatre: the latter segments are presented in black and white and feature the main cast playing the actors who play their characters (try to keep up at the back) onstage.
There’s also Adrien Brody as a theatre director whose failing marriage to his soon-to-be ex-wife (Hong Chao) compounds the stress of mounting the stage production, Jeff Goldblum in an alien costume, and a nice cameo from Willem Dafoe as a very ‘New York’ acting teacher. Oscar-winner Margot Robbie even turns up for a brief scene.
Sadly, with many moments involving actors pondering their process, Asteroid City is just a wee bit too meta for its own good. All the black and white stuff mostly just distracts from the more enjoyable colour storyline and could possibly just have been excised into a separate 'companion' piece.
It also really doesn’t help matters when Anderson gets cute and has one character cross between the two ‘worlds’ just so he can break the fourth wall.
However, there's still quite a lot to enjoy here for fans of this reliably idiosyncratic director and his star-studded cast.
Naturally, anyone else will probably hate it.
RATING: 3/5 (for fans) 1/5 (for non-fans)
Asteroid City is screening at QFT Belfast now, see queensfilmtheatre.com for times and tickets.
