The French Dispatch

Searchlight Pictures | Release Date: October 22, 2021

7.0	USER SCORE Generally favorable reviews based on 204 Ratings

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NavyBeanOct 30, 2021

Come for the Wes Anderson style! Sleep through the Wes Anderson plot. BOR-ING! Wes makes every film look good. The last few just haven’t been entertaining.

2 of 3 users found this helpful21

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Harry_DeanOct 26, 2021

Wes Anderson doing his best Wes Anderson impression. Messy structure, hollow characters and a lack of anything meaningful to say but hey, it looks gorgeous and has Bill Murray so it's sure to please the fanboys. If you're looking for engagingWes Anderson doing his best Wes Anderson impression. Messy structure, hollow characters and a lack of anything meaningful to say but hey, it looks gorgeous and has Bill Murray so it's sure to please the fanboys. If you're looking for engaging characters and in general more than pretty pictures and an ensemble cast, look elsewhere… Expand

0 of 1 users found this helpful01

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davemelbourne58Nov 7, 2021

Wes Anderson has a unique style and look to all of his films. I enjoy his movies for the most part.
I was all in on his first two stories about the final issue of the French Dispatch magazine. Benecio Del Toro, Adrain Brody, and especiallyWes Anderson has a unique style and look to all of his films. I enjoy his movies for the most part.
I was all in on his first two stories about the final issue of the French Dispatch magazine. Benecio Del Toro, Adrain Brody, and especially Tilda Swinton are great in the 2nd story about a tortured artist who's in jail for murder. But the last 2 stories couldn't live up to the firsty 2---hence the mixed bag review from me.… Expand

0 of 1 users found this helpful01

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NickTheCritickApr 23, 2022

Arthur Howitzer Jr., son of the founder and owner of the Liberty (Kansas) newspaper "The Evening Sun", convinced his father years earlier to finance a Sunday supplement and set up the editorial office in Ennui-sur-Blasé. Expatriate to France,Arthur Howitzer Jr., son of the founder and owner of the Liberty (Kansas) newspaper "The Evening Sun", convinced his father years earlier to finance a Sunday supplement and set up the editorial office in Ennui-sur-Blasé. Expatriate to France, "Picnic" becomes "The French Dispatch" and covers the news of the country 'with style'. Because around his desk, Horowitzer Jr. gathered the best journalists of his time. Archaeologists of the newspaper, 'chase' on the field the subject that has been assigned to him: a student protest that turns into idyll, the investigation of a commissioner on the trail of his son's kidnappers, a psychotic artist and convict in love with his guardian, the obituary of Arthur Howitzer Jr, who put down the pen. And the last issue will be an anthology of articles, the best, dedicated to him.
Film as usual, touch of interesting shots, but with this film Wes Anderson begins to repeat itself a bit without offering any new and interesting ideas. A film that smacks of already seen and that adds nothing to the good filmography of the Texan director.… Expand

0 of 1 users found this helpful01

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BrettLDec 13, 2021

Slightly disappointing. A typically solid performance by an ensemble cast and Wes Anderson’s trademark style kept my interest but it never quite reaches the sum of its parts. It does stand as a nice tribute to journalism and the power ofSlightly disappointing. A typically solid performance by an ensemble cast and Wes Anderson’s trademark style kept my interest but it never quite reaches the sum of its parts. It does stand as a nice tribute to journalism and the power of storytelling, though I felt the stories presented could use something more.… Expand

0 of 1 users found this helpful01

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deckFeb 6, 2022

except for "The Concrete Masterpiece" it's at best irrelevant and unappealingly stuffy style that only works with the right story. which is simply not the case for the rest of this movie.

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

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misterDVaderNov 28, 2021

All style, no substance. The movie stretches out its runtime to the extreme. The stories are charming, surreal anecdotes that would make for great short movies, but fail to create a thematically coherent narrative for a feature film. TheAll style, no substance. The movie stretches out its runtime to the extreme. The stories are charming, surreal anecdotes that would make for great short movies, but fail to create a thematically coherent narrative for a feature film. The French Dispatch is lovely to look at. Anderson's signature style is delivered flawlessly - it feels like the movie belongs in a modern theatre. The attention to colour is outstanding among modern filmmakers and the camera work is never just there - it's actively telling a story (if you remember the ratio change at the end of the painter story, you know exactly what I'm talking about). It's a real shame Anderson is a visual artist first, and a storyteller second. The French Dispatch provides no food for thought and leaves your head as soon as you exit the screening room.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

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eva3si0nJan 26, 2022

The French Dispatch is Wes Anderson's most controversial film. This is the most difficult film from him in perception, here is the most stellar cast, several different stories and games with a chromokey. But in the first The French DispatchThe French Dispatch is Wes Anderson's most controversial film. This is the most difficult film from him in perception, here is the most stellar cast, several different stories and games with a chromokey. But in the first The French Dispatch is the director's most personal film and the most boring and passing film. In the second of several stories, holistic only about Benicio del Toro, in the third the film is dedicated to the real newspaper The New Yorker, if you have not read it - the film for you will be a passing one. The film clearly pays tribute to journalism. For the non-Western public, The French Dispatch will be a passing, he will bribe the cast, but disappoint the viewer by the result.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

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JLuis_001Nov 6, 2021

Asking Wes Anderson to change his style at this point in his career is just ridiculous.
It's not unjustifiable of course, but for a film director, more than anything an artist, you can innovate and evolve without changing your way.
And evenAsking Wes Anderson to change his style at this point in his career is just ridiculous.
It's not unjustifiable of course, but for a film director, more than anything an artist, you can innovate and evolve without changing your way.

And even with the things I enjoyed about The French Dispatch, and it pains me to say so, Wes Anderson has fallen into notorious creative indulgence.

Clearly his style is already something that he makes in an automated way, but that also means that he too has put aside any attempt to do something that could shake his formula.

Anderson has never been a director who has put much emphasis on narrative, but at least his films were brimming with humor, grace and wit.
The French Dispatch feels like a film to which he paid the utmost attention to all visual details, but it populated his world with insubstantial, bland, and inconsequential characters. Same goes for all the performances.
At the end of any of his previous works, I always took a favorite character with me. On this one I just couldn't.

The French Dispatch is a lot of style and hardly any substance.
It's all Wes Anderson, but for the first time it feels like an Anderson lacking in creativeness and insight.

He's like a magician who has exhausted his repertoire. The time has come to learn new tricks.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

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FaxthtaxAug 28, 2022

Wes Anderson style is getting tired out. He has done a few movies now with his artistic stylistic style with voice-over storytelling. A style that he pretty much decided to use himself after he saw "Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain". ButWes Anderson style is getting tired out. He has done a few movies now with his artistic stylistic style with voice-over storytelling. A style that he pretty much decided to use himself after he saw "Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain". But its getting stale and predictable by now and he should change direction and find new actors to work with.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

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Mauro_LanariJul 16, 2022

(Mauro Lanari)
Anderson sets his 10th movie in "Ennui-sur-Blasé" ("boredom for exhaustion", "on indifference", "on apathy"), viewers are warned from the beginning. His maniacal "stylosity" reaches the edge of narrative asphyxia (after all,(Mauro Lanari)
Anderson sets his 10th movie in "Ennui-sur-Blasé" ("boredom for exhaustion", "on indifference", "on apathy"), viewers are warned from the beginning. His maniacal "stylosity" reaches the edge of narrative asphyxia (after all, what else would the Cahiers' "politique des auteurs" be? The legacy of the "Nouvelle Vague" is this). Emulating Greenaway's "superfluous storytelling", his "amazing inventions degrade into conventions" (Anna Maria Pasetti), an elitist intellectualism ("The New Yorker") intent on the emotional sacrifice of havin' at heart the characters, the humans, anyone. Seasoned with a foolish humor, "Ennui-sur-Blasé" to the point of dying: it is from the death of the editor of the literary supplement that the feature film starts and it is from the drafting of his epitaph that it takes leave, the all-star cast parades, literally or not, like a funeral procession in front of the corpse of a journalism for journalism and a cinema for cinema, self-celebratory, self-commemorative, self-testamentary, self-ceremonially mournful. Special thanks to Baumbach, to the fellow citizen Linklater (Houston, Texas), to de Palma, Joel Coen, Spielberg.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

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MullonFeb 1, 2022

I am certain this movie is a bunch of stitched together ideas from Wes Anderson's "maybe" pile that he couldn't pad out into full movie scripts. Unfortunately they are not interesting as short films either. The four stories (or maybe six, theI am certain this movie is a bunch of stitched together ideas from Wes Anderson's "maybe" pile that he couldn't pad out into full movie scripts. Unfortunately they are not interesting as short films either. The four stories (or maybe six, the stories have stories), are told almost entirely through narrations like a series of outlines. Most of the time the characters are unmoving while the narration drones on, every character talks exactly the same way in a fast-paced monotone. Any visually interesting pieces are ruined by most of the film being shot in black and white, turning it into grey sludge visually as well as audibly. The only thing that stands out are the normal cinematography tricks Anderson does in all his movies.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

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