Wes Anderson has been featured on many critics’ “best” lists, receiving award nominations and wins. With all of the creativity and originality he puts into every one of his movies, how can he not? Now, just like how Martin Scorsese dropped his 15 best movies of all time, Wes Anderson is among the growing ranks of directors to post what he believes are the ten best films ever made.
Knowing a director’s favorite movies is like getting the opportunity to get inside their mind. As reported by Hypebeast, Wes Anderson created a list for the British magazine Sight and Sound of what he considers to be the ten best movies ever made. Other directors participated in this annual poll like the Safdie Brothers, Luca Guadagnino, Barry Jenkins, and Ari Aster. But, The Grand Budapest Hotel director picked movies that stood out from what these other directors chose, and you wouldn’t expect anything less from this original filmmaker. Take a look at his picks below:
- La Grande Illusion (Jean Renoir, 1937)
- Quai des Orfèvres (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1947)
- The Earrings of Madame de… (Max Ophüls, 1953)
- Vivre Sa Vie (Jean-Luc Godard, 1962)
- The Man Who Loved Women (François Truffaut, 1977)
- Loulou (Maurice Pialat, 1980)
- Vagabond (Agnès Varda, 1985)
- Olivier, Olivier (Agnieszka Holland, 1992)
- It All Starts Today (Bertrand Tavernier, 1999)
- Kings and Queen (Arnaud Desplechin, 2004)
The movies that ended up making it to the top of Sight and Sound’s greatest movies of all time included 2001: A Space Odyssey, Citizen Kane, The Godfather, and Tokyo Story. Surprisingly, these films didn’t make it on Wes Anderson’s list. His entire list is made up of French cinema.
That part isn’t too shocking though considering the whimsically quirky filmmaker currently lives in Paris. Not to mention, he incorporates the beautiful city in his movies like Hotel Chevalier, which is set in Paris, the Eiffel Tower is scribed in Max Fischer’s book in Rushmore, two children dance to "Le temps de l’amour" in Moonrise Kingdom, and Anderson’s latest film was The French Dispatch is an anthology set in a fictional French town.
What makes this list hard to believe is that Wes Anderson’s entries are, as i-d puts it, “murky and depressing.” A lot of the themes for the movies Anderson picked deal with the sorrowful themes of murder, betrayal, and forced sex work. However, while the Moonrise Kingdom filmmaker tends to employ dark themes like depression, murder, and violence into his films it's typically in a deadpan comedic way.
People know what to expect when they see a Wes Anderson movie. It could be possible that the Oscar-winning filmmaker’s intention is to take these themes and revamp them in a way that’s humorous. The Texan director has said that his inspiration for tracking shots comes from photography and French cinema tends to be an artistic medium. So when you think about it, Wes Anderson’s list isn’t surprising if you look deep into his work, both thematically and technically.
The next movie we have to look forward to from Wes Anderson is Asteroid City. Some quick things we know about the 2023 movie release is that it’ll have a sizeable star-studded cast of actors who have never been in an Anderson ensemble including Tom Hanks, Margot Robbie, Maya Hawke, Matt Damon, and Sophia Lillis. Unfortunately, a frequent cast member of Anderson's, Bill Murray, had to drop out of production due to contracting COVID. But, we get another returning collaborator, Alexandre Desplat, who will return for the sixth time to score the film.
Lastly, we know the film will take place in 1955, and it's about students and parents across the country joining a Junior Stargazers convention in a fictional desert town. Just these facts alone are enough for me to put this movie on my watchlist for the upcoming year.
Wes Anderson’s list of his ten favorite movies may be a bit on the depressing side, but they represent the Parisian heart he has held in many of his beloved classics.
Get ready to see Asteroid City in theaters on limited release on June 16th and wide release on June 23rd, 2023.
