THE FRENCH DISPATCH Review — Highbrow Humor at its Peak

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Lisa Johnson Mandell’s The French Dispatch review says Wes Anderson’s latest is erudite and eloquent — the very definition of the word ‘quirky’ — in a good way.

If you want to truly appreciate The French Dispatch, you must understand the meaning of the word ‘ennui.’ Don’t be ashamed if you’re not familiar with the word. Get acquainted with it, and you’ll laugh every time it’s mentioned, which is a lot, considering it’s the name of the figurative French city in which Wes Anderson’s erudite comedy is based.

I’ll make it easy for you:

en·nui
/änˈwē/
noun

he succumbed to ennui and despair

The always delightful director is back with a flourish with this typically candy colored, quirky and delicious work, which could well end up the funniest film of the year. It’s about the making of the last issue of a magazine, (actually based on a real one), published by American journalists in France, for an American audience, although it has an international subscription rate of about 500,000.

Each writer tells a different tale about the city of Ennui, covering politics, art, cuisine, culture, etc.So it’s several individual stories linked together, on the death of the editor, played by Bill Murray.

The cast is unrivaled, with many of their parts small but mighty — blink and you’ll miss them, so don’t blink. You can keep your eyes open for the film’s tidy one hour 47 minute duration. It’s worth it to see Benecio del Toro, Tilda Swinton, Frances McDormandAdrian Brody, Lea Seydoux (whom you recently saw in No Time to Die as the love of James Bond’s life), Jeffery Wright, Timothee Chalamet (big weekend for him, as he’s also opening in Dune), Edward Norton, Owen Wilson, Saoirse Ronan, Elisabeth Moss, Jason Schwartzman, Willem Dafoe, Henry Winkler, Bob Balaban, Christoph Waltz, Liev Schreiber, Lois Smith, Rupert Friend and yes, even more.

If you know Wes Anderson, you’ll agree that this is one of his most wonderfully Wes Andersony. If you’re not familiar with his work, I encourage you to give this one a try — you just might acquire a taste for his work in the first five minutes, and you’ll be up for some of the most fabulous binging ever in the future.

If this The French Dispatch review makes you want to hop on your bicyclette and see it at a theater near you, get times and tickets at Fandango.com.

Lisa Johnson Mandell’s The French Dispatch review says Wes Anderson’s latest is erudite and eloquent — the very definition of the word ‘quirky’ — in a good way.


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Lisa Johnson Mandell

Lisa Johnson Mandell is an award winning journalist, author and film/TV critic. She can be heard regularly on Cumulus radio stations throughout the US, and seen on Rotten Tomatoes. She is the author of three bestselling books, and spends as much of her free time as possible with her husband Jim and her jolly therapy Labradoodle Frankie Feldman.

2 Comments

  1. […] (Maluma) has been cheating on her. So she randomly picks some poor schlep out of the audience (Owen Wilson) to take her instant ex’s place on stage, er… at the […]

  2. […] still spooktacular fun. It’s almost impossible not be engaged by the original cast—Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson and even Slimer—banding together […]

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