Anderson goes Grand – A welcome stay at The Grand Budapest Hotel

In theaters Friday: Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Dom Hemingway, Island of Lemurs: Madagascar

New on Blu-ray/Streaming: 47 Ronin, Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues

Like the surly, washed up antihero he gave audiences 9 years ago in the form of The Life Aquatic‘s saltwater icon Steve Zissou (Bill Murray), Wes Anderson’s latest, The Grand Budapest Hotel, presents audiences with another singularly suspicious subject on which the balance of a capricious caper rests in Ralph Fiennes’ prim and peculiar M. Gustav.

A lonely a man out of time in a pre-war Eastern European fantasia called the Republic of Zubrowka, Fiennes’ performance as the iron-fisted glad-hand of a majestic hotel who provides his elderly (and very wealthy) female guests with far more than room service is an astounding performance—one that begs the Academy to create a Best Comedic Actor category and mail the English thespian his statue now. Whether he’s being too obsessively precious by half or spouting sudden bursts of quippy vulgarity, Fiennes is always a joy to watch. He has a surprise for audiences in every single scene.

After a tender but procedurally slow introduction—we go from The Grand Budapest Hotel the book, to its author, to a flashback of how the author wrote said book, all before actually getting to Gustav’s tale—the hotel manager’s delicately designed world is pierced by two unexpected incidents: First, a wildcard immigrant is hoisted upon him as his new apprentice (read: lobby boy). Second, Gustav’s wrinkly paramour Madame D.—played by a very aged Tilda Swinton—dies under suspicious circumstances. The former presents Gustav with the challenge of becoming a father figure to an orphan, while the second ignites a rumble for Madame D.’s considerable fortune amongst her many possible heirs.

It seems Gustav’s physical favors for Madame D. paid dividends as she made a late amendment to her will giving him possession of a priceless painting called, humorously, “Boy with Apple.” Here, our villains emerge with Madame D’s son, Dmitri—played perfectly snaky and enraged by Adrien Brody—and his thuggish associate, Willem Dafoe’s brass-knuckled enforcer Jopling, set out to get the painting back. Both actors chew this period scenery with ease, and they bring a darker edge to the Anderson fold than has ever been on screen before.

Since his 1996 debut Bottle Rocket presented a somnambulant, clocks-stopped version of Dallas, and in particular, when 2001’s aesthetic-solidifying, mythical-by-way-of-Salinger New York City of The Royal Tenenbaums hit, its been clear that Wes Anderson is less interested in telling stories set in the real world and more in favor of constructing elaborate environments of truth-bearing artifice in which his colorful characters can try and fail and succeed and stumble and discover new things about themselves and our world as it is reflected in the universal themes of theirs.

The Grand Budapest Hotel is Wes Anderson’s highest achievement in this regard, a unique creation that is whole cloth and engrossing, and visually on par with masters like Stanley Kubrick and Terrence Malick. Where The Life Aquatic‘s similarly vast cast and plot lines felt, at times, scattershot and tonally jarring, Budapest feels, after the first 15 minutes at least, completely of a piece, a singular thought and vibe running at breakneck speed to a thrilling climax.

Like Bottle Rocket and Fantastic Mr. Fox before it, Budapest is at its best when it is a comedy of errors, its hero’s flaws laid bare for the sake of laughs and endearing empathy. The Life Aquatic or even the more modestly ambitious and charming Moonrise Kingdom had all of the key players and pieces in place, but Budapest finally sees Anderson as a conductor orchestrating those players and pieces to near perfection.

Are there too many asides and minor characters? Perhaps. Having Jason Schwartzman and Owen Wilson pop up briefly is hilarious, but once Bill Murray is on screen you want to see more of him, and he’s given so little to do. Plus the aforementioned intro is gorgeously shot (as is the entire film by Robert Yeoman), but hardly essential. Do you want to watch a Sherlock Holmes movie that begins with 10 minutes of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle on a dinner date? This section, featuring Jude Law and as the author and F. Murray Abraham and as an older version of Gustav’s trusty lobby boy, could have easily been dropped, or else crafted into a short, separate prologue in the vein of The Darjeeling Limited‘s precursor Hotel Chevalier.

These are minor critiques, though. My only major complaint is the lack of character development for Saoirse Ronan’s romantic lead, a birth-marked baker who falls for Gustav’s lobby boy, Zero, played by newcomer Tony Revolori. Focusing more on their burgeoning relationship—particularly in light of the theme of the film’s latter day bookends—could have added greater depth to Anderson’s emotional slate. Perhaps Anderson thought he’d already said what he has to say about young love with runaway dramedy Moonrise Kingdom. Or maybe this is Gustav’s coming of age story, not Zero’s, and it is a thoroughly entertaining one at that.

Finally mastering and refining his own quirky brand of comedy, drama and action, and balancing each element with ease, every frame of The Grand Budapest Hotel is loaded with creativity and care, a gorgeous-looking period farce with affecting twists and turns and stellar performances (Fiennes and Brody in particular), which makes it Anderson’s finest achievement since The Royal Tenenbaums.

Watch the trailer below: