The films of Wes Ander­son – ranked

Rank­ing the films of Wes Ander­son may seem a some­what futile task con­sid­er­ing the man­i­fold mer­its inher­ent in the director’s extra­or­di­nary oeu­vre, but it’s a task we’ve tak­en on all the same. The high­ly sci­en­tif­ic rank­ing sys­tem employed in this fea­ture involved months of prepa­ra­tion and a secret bal­lot which can­vased the opin­ions of WA fans over five con­ti­nents – The Anvers Island Wes­friends of Antar­ti­ca (AIWOA) could sad­ly not be reached for com­ment. And so, for your delec­ta­tion, here are Wes Anderson’s nine fea­ture films ranked from great to greatest…

Why is The Dar­jeel­ing Lim­it­ed the runt of the lit­ter? Owen Wil­son, Adrien Brody and Jason Schwartz­man as estranged broth­ers, (Fran­cis, Peter and Jack) attempt­ing to bond dur­ing a train trip is not an inher­ent­ly flawed con­ceit. Fran­cis slip­ping lam­i­nat­ed dai­ly itin­er­aries under his broth­ers’ doors is a bril­liant, endur­ing joke that high­lights how in fam­i­lies one person’s source of solemn impor­tance is another’s pin­na­cle of ridicu­lous­ness. The film’s undo­ing is that by set­ting the action in India, as opposed to a fic­tion­al India-inspired loca­tion, it makes friv­o­lous use of the coun­try and its customs.

Wes Anderson’s worlds are not of this world. They are immac­u­late bub­bles. Inside the safe enclo­sures of Anderson’s aes­thet­ic fan­tasies, dead­pan char­ac­ters and their dead­pan melan­choly res­onates. The Dar­jeel­ing Lim­it­ed is ded­i­cat­ed to and inspired by Satya­jit Ray – a direc­tor whose films dug deep into the exist­ing world at a slow and flow­ing pace. In oth­er words, he was Anderson’s rhyth­mic and aes­thet­ic oppo­site. Respect­ful as this homage may be, its notes sound tin­ny in this for­eign land. Sophie Monks Kaufman

“On the run from John­ny Law… Ain’t no trip to Cleve­land.” WA’s first movie out of the gate was a large­ly suc­cess­ful attempt to pro­duce a straight com­e­dy (though per­fume of melan­cholic tragedy seen in his lat­er films are cer­tain­ly present) first made head­lines as a mis-mar­ket­ed box office bomb, the pun­dits point­ing and laugh­ing as this pur­port­ed Reser­voir Dogs knock-off plum­met­ed into obscurity.

While Tarantino’s debut sits at a cosy stall right at a cross­roads in ​’90s film his­to­ry, Bot­tle Rock­et might actu­al­ly be deemed the bet­ter film, a bun­gled crime caper revolv­ing around a lead char­ac­ter whose pluck and mox­ie shroud seri­ous psy­cho­log­i­cal dam­age. It’s the film that intro­duced the world to Owen Wil­son, and his tena­cious, yel­low jump-suit­ed career crim­i­nal Dig­nan remains one of Anderson’s great­est cre­ations, a man who uses nefar­i­ous activ­i­ties as a way to pre­serve the lost thrill of boy­hood monkeyshines.

Though played for the laughs, the sto­ry opens with Dig­nan ​“break­ing out” of some kind of low secu­ri­ty san­i­tar­i­um, his pal Antho­ny (Luke Wil­son) assist­ing in this strange ruse to keep things cheery. Vari­a­tions of this set-up are played over and over as Antho­ny has the ten­sile strength of his friend­ship test­ed as Dignan’s schemes get grander and more dan­ger­ous. It’s a sweet, small, beau­ti­ful­ly writ­ten film, every­thing that we know and love about Ander­son – the geo­met­ric fram­ing, the ​’70s AM radio rock hits, the iron­ic non-sequiturs, deep focus pho­tog­ra­phy, the com­e­dy of depres­sion – is all there for the tak­ing. As is the late Kumar Pal­lana, star­ring here as ace local safe-crack­er Kumar and who would also turn up in Rush­more and The Roy­al Tenen­baums. David Jenk­ins

A great film, but a tran­si­tion­al work with­in the WA canon. With the gift of hind­sight, it feels like a project made to dust away any cre­ative cob­webs that may have been form­ing over the pre­vi­ous two pic­tures, a refresh­ing of the clas­sic Ander­son for­mat aimed at a slight­ly dif­fer­ent audi­ence. Aes­thet­i­cal­ly speak­ing, the film remains a true orig­i­nal, made using stop-frame ani­ma­tion and 3D mod­els, but in a way which neu­tralis­es the depth of the field. Spec­tac­u­lar and eccen­tric details fill the frame, and unlike many sim­i­lar labour inten­sive enter­pris­es, Fan­tas­tic Mr Fox is riv­en with nar­ra­tive digres­sions, sin­gle-serv­ing side char­ac­ters and bril­liant throw-away details.

It’s an adap­ta­tion of the 1974 children’s nov­el by Roald Dahl, and it’s hard to think of a more per­fect union of cre­ative minds. The sto­ry cen­tres on the wily Mr Fox (voiced by George Clooney), under­go­ing a mys­te­ri­ous exis­ten­tial cri­sis, while hav­ing to attend to the fact that three repel­lent farm­ers want to clear this ver­min of their land. Though Mr Fox is clear­ly the hero of the piece, the film itself is a com­plex moral fable about the anx­i­eties that come from just try­ing to sur­vive in this harsh world, espe­cial­ly the under­min­ing shame that’s felt from not being able to feed your own fam­i­ly. DJ

Absolute­ly the most Ander­son­ian film to date, dar­ling, tak­en to a fab­u­lous­ly camp place by the com­ic per­for­mance of Ralph Fiennes. As M Gus­tave H concierge of The Grand Budapest Hotel, Fiennes is a fleet-foot­ed, sex­u­al­ly-effi­cient ver­sion of Burt Lan­cast­er in The Leop­ard – the last man stand­ing for a noble but crum­bling way of life. Anderson’s ear for farce is peak. He cap­tures the rhythms of a caper film, matched step-for-step by Fiennes whose mouth and body are always on the go. He speaks in per­fect clipped tones, impart­ing his val­ues to wide-eyed pro­tégé, Zero (Tony Revelori).

Stefan’s Zweig’s writ­ings inspired the sto­ry, set in the Repub­lic of Zubrows­ka. This fic­tion­al set­ting is a plau­si­ble site for every­thing that Ander­son trea­sures. It is a pas­tel-hued, old-fash­ioned doll­house inhab­it­ed by col­lab­o­ra­tors, old and new, all unit­ed by the dra­ma of their faces. Willem Defoe as a punk-goth Nos­fer­atu of a vil­lain is too much (in a good way). Adrien Brody has a lus­trous mous­tache. Saoirse Ronan adds a splash of seren­i­ty as an employ­ee for the intri­cate­ly con­struct­ed Mendl’s cakes. SMK

In 1959, Louis Malle and Jacques-Yves Cousteau picked up the most pres­ti­gious prize in moviedom – the Palme d’Or – for their marine biol­o­gy-themed doc­u­men­tary, The Silent World. This amaz­ing film saw Cousteau cast as an intre­pid explor­er, tak­ing to the high seas in his boat and head­ing into the briny deep to pho­to­graph the won­der­ful seal­ife that lives there. Inspired by this, and Cousteau’s count­less oth­er nature doc­u­men­taries, Wes Ander­son made The Life Aquat­ic With Steve Zis­sou, a mas­ter­ful, sin­gu­lar work which takes the Cousteau tem­plate and style, and asks – what if he were going through a mid-life cri­sis? Arguably Bill Murray’s great­est star­ring role, his Zis­sou is a tac­i­turn bas­tard with a heart of gold, the unswerv­ing ado­ra­tion he receives from his rag-tag crew an affir­ma­tion that, dur­ing the run time of the movie, we’re see­ing him at a less-than-ide­al time in his life.

For one, his old­est friend was killed by the elu­sive Jaguar Shark, so revenge is at the fore­front of his mind. Add to that, his estranged son (Owen Wil­son), has returned to the fray in an attempt to appre­ci­ate his father’s whim­si­cal occu­pa­tion, his wife (Anjel­i­ca Hus­ton) is los­ing inter­est in him, and a jour­nal­ist (Cate Blanchett) is doc­u­ment­ing his every move. The film explores how our mind fights against depres­sion, often con­vinc­ing the body that it has to car­ry out irra­tional tasks as a way to achieve metaphor­i­cal clo­sure on a painful episode in life. Steve intents to car­ry this out with explo­sives. DJ

It’s nev­er a good idea to think you’ve ​“got” a Wes Ander­son film on the back of a lone view­ing. Isle of Dogs, for instance, is – like a lov­ing and faith­ful mutt – the gift that keeps on giv­ing. Even after a third or forth watch, there’s so much back­ground detail to enjoy, and new places to train your eye in the frame. But also, with repeat view­ings, the sub­tle­ty and the emo­tion of the cen­tral sto­ry­line come to the fore, as a young boy with con­nec­tions to a cor­rupt, dog-hat­ing politi­co, risks life, limb and fam­i­ly hon­our to save his beloved secu­ri­ty dog from annihilation.

This is Anderson’s ode to the Ital­ian neo­re­al­ist direc­tor Vit­to­rio De Sica, who made films in which a sim­ple quest nar­ra­tive allowed for an explo­ration of a soci­ety full of poet­ry and sor­row. In The Bicy­cle Thieves, a father and son search for a stolen bike. In Umber­to D, an elder­ly man search­es for his lost dog. Ander­son takes this dead­ly sim­ple base mate­r­i­al and trans­forms it into and eccen­tric adven­ture flick for the ages. If Fan­tas­tic Mr Fox was his tri­al run in the domain of ani­ma­tion, then Isle of Dogs, is his first attempt prop­er, and he real­ly did yield some stag­ger­ing results. DJ

A Wes Ander­son movie with a blos­som­ing love sto­ry at its core! The fact that it’s a love sto­ry between 12-year-olds, Sam (Jared Gilman) and Sal­ly (Kara Hay­ward), who run away togeth­er lean­ing on Sam’s scout sur­vival skills, does noth­ing to under­mine its weight. The adults dis­agree but the adults can’t han­dle their own prob­lems. Anderson’s most melan­choly char­ac­ter ever is played by Bill Mur­ray. He wouldn’t mind if the approach­ing tor­na­do blew him away, he tells no-non­sense wife (Frances McDor­mand). Part of the sor­row comes from know­ing that the tor­na­do won’t touch him. Life will make him see it through.

Anderson’s con­sis­tent­ly delight­ful sound­track choic­es reach a new lev­el. The most icon­ic scene fea­tures the run­aways in a remote beach cove danc­ing in their under­wear to Françoise Hardy. The ensem­ble sup­port cast are well cho­sen, each adding a dif­fer­ent piquan­cy and fre­quen­cy. Anderson’s reg­u­lar cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er, Robert Yeo­man, out­does him­self, cap­tur­ing images with a cam­era that some­times glides, some­times zooms and some­times com­pos­es the world with breath­tak­ing sym­me­try. SMK

Elliot Smith’s ​‘Nee­dle in the Hay’ finds its cin­e­mat­ic home in the sequence in which Richie Tenen­baum (Luke Wil­son) shaves his face and then slash­es his wrists. Wes Anderson’s way of work­ing with the same peo­ple makes him syn­ony­mous with fam­i­ly units. The Roy­al Tenen­baums is his most overt sto­ry about fam­i­lies. There is space for each mem­ber to feel com­plete, replete with per­son­alised looks, man­ners and dis­ap­point­ments. Richie is in love with his adopt­ed sis­ter, Mar­got. Gwyneth Pal­trow with her kohl-eyes and fur coat has the qual­i­ty of an angel strick­en by her fall to earth. The oth­er Ander­son (Paul) har­nessed it in Hard Eight.

Wes finds her still­ness, at odds with the tetchy move­ments of her red-track­suit wear­ing broth­er, Chas (Ben Stiller) and the jaun­ti­ness of the head of the fam­i­ly, Roy­al (Gene Hack­man). He and Ethe­line (Angel­i­ca Hus­ton) are sep­a­rat­ed and his ter­mi­nal ill­ness is the trig­ger for an attempt­ed reunion. What fol­lows is an ele­gant sprawl of vignettes that reveal the dys­func­tions of the fam­i­ly and the indi­vid­u­als with­in it. Tragedy and com­e­dy hold hands through­out, tak­ing it in turns to step grace­ful­ly to the fore. The look of the film is per­fect­ly New York and per­fect­ly tran­scen­dent of it. SMK

Rush­more is Wes Anderson’s ​‘Revolver’ – we love every­thing that he has made since, but in the end, this one is the dad­dy, accept no sub­sti­tutes. Where Bot­tle Rock­et was pis­tol-whipped to the floor by mar­ket­ing boys des­per­ate­ly try­ing to ​“place” it onto the movie land­scape, the director’s sec­ond fea­ture was a case of being forced to accept that it is what it is, and that’s how it should be sold.

Time Out’s Tom Char­i­ty – bemused by the film at the time of his release – described its lead char­ac­ter, Max Fis­ch­er (Jason Schwartz­man), as a com­bi­na­tion of Jay Gats­by and Fer­ris Bueller, and while the for­mer feels bang on, it’s hard to see the bump­tious, love-me, pre-pack­aged movie idol sheen of the lat­ter. He deploys the trag­ic ener­gy of a Welles ​“hero” – George Amber­son Minafer or even Charles Fos­ter Kane – his aggres­sive push for social bet­ter­ment nudg­ing him unknow­ing­ly to a great fall.

Rush­more asks whether social activ­i­ties, sports, the arts, com­mu­ni­ty organ­is­ing, are tac­tics for­mu­lat­ed by a soci­ety as a way to pre­vent the cul­ti­va­tion of inti­mate human rela­tions, and it’s not just through Max’s wacky tra­vails, but also those of drunk­en indus­tri­al­ist Her­man Blume, who neglects both his fam­i­ly and his own heart. Olivia Williams’ sup­ply teacher Miss Cross enters into the fray and courts the atten­tion of both men, forc­ing them to dis­solve their own fast friend­ship. For us, this one comes top because it remains Anderson’s most com­plete and most focused dra­ma – there are cute asides and set-pieces, but here they all serve to enhance the over­all mood of the film.

One of the film’s most mem­o­rable aspects – and arguably the facet which helped to entrench itself with­in the annuls of mod­ern com­e­dy greats – is the work under­tak­en by the Max Fis­ch­er Play­ers: Broad­way-sized high school the­atre rein­ter­pre­ta­tions of clas­sic movies. It’s a rare exam­ple of Ander­son mak­ing a state­ment about cin­e­ma as an out­let to purge and express feel­ings, but also as a cre­ative medi­um that could be used to impress, alien­ate and tit­il­late those expe­ri­enc­ing it. In the case of this emo­tion­al and com­ic wreck­ing ball, there are safe­ty glass­es and earplugs under your seats. Please feel free to use them. Oh, and let’s not for­get the cher­ry on the top of this sweet gateaux: one of the most beau­ti­ful final scenes ever filmed. DJ