2 reviews so far

• Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

  I saw this movie over the weekend. It is visually beautiful and clever - decribed variously as annoyingly hipster or mellow nostalgia. The story arc is interesting if a bit predictable. It's the details that are totally whack. The acting is underplayed and superb from a bunch of industry veterans, and well cast newcomers in the children's roles.

  My only criticism, like of all of Wes Anderson's films, is the lack of self-editing. It's hard to believe anything is left on the cutting room floor, or indeed the wastepaper bin of discarded "ideas for a film scene". I'd hardly be surprised if a bunch of alien spaceships appeared. The sort of "brilliant" whacky, film one wrote stoned with some mates at uni and woke up the next day and thought "what were we thinking?". We are in no doubt what Anderson is thinking - it's all there on the screen. But for it's look and originality, and seductively sweet performances, it is worth seeing. I suspect lots of films like this get thought up late at night, but only Wes Anderson's get made. Giving hope to stoners everywhere.

  Commenter

  StBob

  Location

  Melbourne

  Date and time

  August 28, 2012, 1:10PM

• Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

  'Ah Love, could you and I with fate conspire
  To grasp this sorry scheme of things entire,
  Would we not shatter it to bits - and then
  Remould it nearer to the heart's desire!' -- Omar Khayyam

  In Moonrise Kingdom Wes Anderson revisits the old literary tradition of creating a liminal space, a forest or an island (in his case both), peopling it with strange and perhaps magical creatures, some comical, some threatening, adding a pair of lovers with apparently insoluble problems, bathing the whole place in luminous, golden light and throwing in a dramatic and cleansing storm to wash away any residual unhappiness. These are the places where there is time to pause, explore problems, and try to find solutions, even if you are a twelve year old orphan and a young girl watching her family disintegrate. There are unobtrusive echos of The Tempest and As You Like It, and enchanting references to Noah's Ark. You know at once that belief like grief should be suspended and that, somehow, the end will be 'nearer to the heart's desire'.

  In turns funny, disturbingly sad, even a little frightening, Moonrise Kingdom is set in 1960s New England; Boy Scouts loom large and Sam (Jared Gilman) approaches running away with well-honed practical skills. Suzy (Kara Hayward) on the other hand brings books, a battery-powered record player, her kitten and a supply of cat food. Like The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra which features in an emotive score, each life and its emerging story adds to an understanding of the whole and comes together in fugue to ensure a solution.

  Established actors, Francis McDormand, Bill Murray, Bruce Willis, Tilda Swinton play against a young and very accomplished cast, proving that you really can work with dogs and children.

  Commenter

  Rangdalion

  Location

  Marrickville

  Date and time

  August 31, 2012, 3:48PM

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