Empire Magazine (2008) Greatest Movies List - #159: The Royal Tenenbaums

I suppose it would be possible to run into a character from Wes Anderson’s The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) in real life, but the odds of running into that entire family seems next to impossible. The unique filmmaker’s third film ups the ante from his previous film Rushmore, so of course things become quirkier as he further advances towards his current masterpiece The Grand Budapest Hotel.

The Royal Tenenbaums has all of his usual visual styles, musical preferences, and of course two of his usual collaborators, Bill Murray and Owen Wilson. The story is very “Wes Anderson,” so if it is your first time watching one of his films you may be caught by surprise, as I was when I first watched it in 2002. The film was nominated for many awards and is described as a comedy-drama, but there not many moments when you will be laughing out loud. As the film open with Alec Baldwin narrating the various exploits of the Tenenbaum children you have to wonder if the whole thing is not some long elaborate joke thought out by Anderson and Wilson his co-writer.

All three of the Tenenbaum children are described as prodigies in their own fields, with Chas Tenenbaum (Ben Stiller) being an expert in finances, but for some reason always wear the same red jumpsuit along with his two children Ari and Uzi. Brother Richie (Luke Wilson) is a tennis champion who retired after a meltdown on the court and then spent months living on an ocean liner. Adopted sister Margot (Gwyneth Paltrow) is a playwright who has many secrets kept from the family, and who is married to neurologist Raleigh St. Clair (Bill Murray, sporting a beard). Finally there is Eli Cash (Owen Wilson), a close friend of the family for years who gained fame for writing Western novels.

The parents of these oddballs are of course equally outlandish, yet patriarch Royal Tenebaum (Gene Hackman) stands out due to his failures instead of his achievements. Whereas his wife Etheline (Anjelica Huston) is a famous archaeologist and author, Royal is a disbarred lawyer with a poor track record as a father. He once shot one of the kids with a BB gun, can be blatantly insensitive, but compared to the rest of the characters he almost comes off as the normal one, maybe it is because Hackman stands out from Anderson’s material. Yet he has a lot of fun as Royal, especially when he goes out with Ari and Uzi for some fun, which in his mind consists of shoplifting and dog fighting.

The reason for all of these characters to come together is because Royal claims he has developed a form of cancer that leaves him with six weeks to live. He wishes to make amends for his past mistakes, but his children are not quick to forgive or even to believe him. Given past behaviour they probably shouldn’t.

A movie could probably be made about each of these characters separately, but put together the result is almost too quirky for the movie’s own good. What is a first-time viewer of Anderson’s work to make of the character of Pagoda (Kumar Pallana) a family servant who was once an assassin that stabbed Royal?

All of the actors in The Royal Tenenbaums are all very effective in their assigned roles, the writing was so good it ended up influencing both Arrested Development and Alec Baldwin’s role in 30 Rock. However if you are new to Anderson’ world, it may not be the best place to start.

Empire Magazine (2008) Greatest Movies List - #97: Reservoir Dogs

One of the most surprising things about Quentin Tarantino’s debut film Reservoir Dogs (1992) is the fact that it has never been adapted for the stage. They will make a show out of Beauty and the Beast , Monty Python and the Holy Grail , and even Spider-Man , but somehow a movie in which most of the action takes place in a warehouse has never made it to Broadway? In any case, this was the movie that announced the arrival of the insatiable film fan that could regurgitate everything he had learned watching movies at the video store into stories filled with sudden bursts of violence, sharp-dressed characters, awesome soundtracks, and crackling dialogue. Since this violent piece of American cinema came out at a time when I was still learning basic math in elementary school there was no way I would watch this on the big screen. However as the years went by it became a cult classic, and even a classic of the independent movies genre, and was re-released on special edition DVD for its

Empire Magazine (2008) Greatest Movies List - #49: Evil Dead 2

What do you get when you mix buckets of fake blood, creative camera operators, the humour of the Three Stooges, and a man with the most recognizable chin in Hollywood? You get Evil Dead II (1987), the horror classic that somehow manages to remake the original in the first 15 minutes and yet feel entirely original. Even though it is mostly set in a cabin in the woods, that staple location in the horror genre, it feels like a roller coaster ride. This is especially true once the film's hero, the scrappy Ash Williams, embraces the madness by arming himself with a sawed-off shotgun and attaching a chainsaw where his hand used to be. "Groovy" indeed. This gore-soaked franchise has had a long run, starting off with one low-budget movie directed by a young Sam Raimi and then growing into two sequels, a remake, comic books and a TV show with three seasons. My starting point was the third entry, Army of Darkness, which moves the action to the Middle Ages with the same

Empire Magazine (2008) Greatest Movies List - #102: The Hustler

Robert Rossen’s The Hustler (1961) is proof that any sport can be used for good cinematic drama even if that sport is pool. Although this is not a game that involves a massive sport arena and bloody boxing gloves, things can get dramatically interesting if the monetary stakes are high, and visually arresting if the filmmakers shoot from the right angle. It also helps a lot if the man putting his money on the table is played by a young Paul Newman in a career-breaking role. Prior to watching the film I had a vague idea of the meaning of the word “hustling” and a rather passive interest in the game of pool. It’s a fun game to play if you are having a couple of nachos and chicken wings on a Friday evening with friends, but I didn’t see it as a spectator sport. Watching The Hustler in the classics section of Netflix two years ago was a bit of an education since it shows the sport as a way of life for some people, and a huge source of revenue for big time gamblers. Newman star as

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