'The Phoenician Scheme' Trailer Is the Most Wes Anderson Thing Ever
There's a new trailer for a new Wes Anderson film, The Phoenician Scheme, and that means Wes Anderson fans everywhere are about to feel very conflicted. Is this going to be awesome? Or is the beloved director just playing the hits?
Ever since he gave us the hilarious and very specifically quirky 1996 film Bottle Rocket, Wes Anderson has dominated a certain corner of eccentric cinema. But, arguably, following 2001's Gene Hackman-led The Royal Tenenbaums, the Wes Anderson aesthetic sometimes seems to trump the Wes Anderson substance. To put it another way, all Anderson fans had this debate: Yes, 2023's Asteroid City was excellent and looked stunning, but was it as moving or resonant as 2004's The Life Aquatic?
These are the conundrums that even the most diehard Anderson fans have when a new movie comes out, and the trailer for The Phoenician Scheme will only bring all those debates back.
The movie is another period piece and stars Benicio del Toro as Zsa-zsa Kord, a scheming rich person. He's joined by Mia Threapleton as Liesl, who is his daughter and also a nun. Michael Cera as Bjorn, their tutor. And then, in usual Anderson style, the rest of the cast is insanely stacked: Riz Ahmed, Tom Hanks, Bryan Cranston, Mathieu Amalric, Richard Ayoade, Jeffrey Wright, Scarlett Johansson, Benedict Cumberbatch, Rupert Friend, and Hope Davis all co-star.
It all looks delightful, colorful, deadpan, and weird. It also seems very in line with the diffuse, desert aesthetic of Asteroid City, which makes one wonder if we're in Anderson's outdoor heat phase.
Either way, it's hard to say if The Phoenician Scheme is a new Wes Anderson classic, or if the film simply looks and feels like classic Wes Anderson.
The Phoenician Scheme hits theaters on May 30, 2025.
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