Asteroid City: Why Wes Anderson’s new film with Tom Hanks and Margot Robbie is going to be huge
It’s been two years since everyone’s favourite maker of loveably odd movies, Wes Anderson, last dropped a film, which was 2021’s The French Dispatch, and let’s be honest, it was no-one’s favourite Wes Anderson film.
But the good news is two years on and he’s got another film, his 11th, out next week. Asteroid City has just premiered at Cannes Film Festival for the first time and received a six-minute standing ovation. The reviews so far from the critics in Cannes have pretty much all been really positive, too, with some calling it his best work in years.
The Guardian called the film “an exhilarating triumph of pure style,” while Variety called the piece “visually dazzling and dramatically inert.” While The Telegraph’s positive review said “beware – this is Wes Anderson’s oddest film yet.” Overall, the film has a very good 84% Positive review ratting on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes.
Everything you need to know about Wes Anderson’s Asteroid City
Anderson’s new feature is a romantic comedy set in a remote American desert town in the 1950s. Similarly to The French Dispatch, it follows three overlapping stories set during a space convention which is being hosted in the town.
An alien arrives, and the government quarantines everyone in Asteroid City to keep them safe, echoing recent years with the pandemic.
At the centre of the plot is a widowed father of four, played by Anderson favourite Jason Schwartzman. Stuck in the city due to the shutdown, he enlists the help of his father-in-law, played by Tom Hanks, to help with the kids while he develops a relationship with a famous actress stuck in the town, played by Scarlett Johansson.
Anderson shot in Chinchón, a town near Madrid, during last year and co-wrote the story with Roman Coppola, who has collaborated with Anderson on many of his films including Moonrise Kingdom and The Darjeeling Limited.
As ever with Anderson, the film’s cast is an A-Z of the biggest stars in Hollywood, although Bill Murray is a notable emission.
The film also stars Bryan Cranston, Adrien Brody, Steve Carell, Margot Robbie, Jeff Goldbum, Willem Dafoe and Tilda Swinton.
Asteroid City lands in UK cinemas on Friday 23 June
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