Directed by: Wes Anderson
Starring: Benicio del Toro, Mia Threapleton, Tom Hanks, Bryan Cranston, Scarlett Johansson, Riz Ahmed, Jeffrey Wright, Mathieu Almaric, Benedict Cumberbatch, Michael Cera
Wes Anderson's movies used to be quirky, but still retained their humanity. Now, Anderson's actors behave like aliens have taken over their bodies and turned them into pod people. I used that description for Anderson's last disaster Asteroid City and the same applies with The Phoenician Scheme, a dreary Anderson comedy which reveals the emperor having no clothes. Nor any laughs.
The Phoenician Scheme is all odd behavior and offbeat production design. It begins with billionaire con artist Zsa Zsa Korda (del Toro) surviving a sixth plane crash which was likely one of many assassination attempts on his life. Korda takes this in stride as the price of doing his shady business practices. A conglomerate seated around a conference table wants to disrupt his business. We learn Korda has one biological child, a nun named Liesl (Threapleton), to whom he wants to leave his fortune. He has eight other children, all adopted, who live across the street from him.
Korda and Liesl travel to various places to put Korda's "Phoenician Scheme" together, trying to cover financing with people just as shady and strange as him. The actors all recite their lines deadpan with occasional screaming at each other. The sets upstage the actors, and we're talking a top-notch cast. Like Woody Allen in his prime, Anderson is able to assemble A-list casts. However, unlike Allen, Anderson doesn't provide a project worthy of their talents.
Anderson needs to return to movies which are off-kilter but still have a plot and characters we care about. The Phoenician Scheme doesn't provide any payoff, just boredom.
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