The French Dispatch
The French Dispatch (titled onscreen as The French Dispatch of the Liberty, Kansas Evening Sun) is a 2021 American anthology comedy drama film written, directed, and produced by Wes Anderson from a story he conceived with Roman Coppola, Hugo Guinness, and Jason Schwartzman. It features an expansive ensemble cast and follows three different storylines as the French foreign bureau of the fictional Liberty, Kansas Evening Sun newspaper publishes its final issue.
The French Dispatch
Wes Anderson
- Wes Anderson
- Roman Coppola
- Hugo Guinness
- Jason Schwartzman
- Wes Anderson
- Steven Rales
- Jeremy Dawson
- Owen Wilson
- Benicio del Toro
- Tony Revolori
- Adrien Brody
- Tilda Swinton
- Bob Balaban
- Henry Winkler
- Léa Seydoux
- Frances McDormand
- Timothée Chalamet
- Lyna Khoudri
- Christoph Waltz
- Rupert Friend
- Jeffrey Wright
- Liev Schreiber
- Mathieu Amalric
- Stephen Park
- Willem Dafoe
- Edward Norton
- Saoirse Ronan
- Bill Murray
- Elisabeth Moss
- Jason Schwartzman
- Fisher Stevens
- Anjelica Huston
108 minutes
United States[3]
$25 million[4]
The first segment, "The Concrete Masterpiece", follows an incarcerated and unstable painter, and stars Benicio del Toro, Adrien Brody, Tilda Swinton and Léa Seydoux. The second, "Revisions to a Manifesto", is inspired by the May 68 student protests, and stars Frances McDormand, Timothée Chalamet, and Lyna Khoudri. The third, "The Private Dining Room of the Police Commissioner" features Jeffrey Wright, Mathieu Amalric, and Stephen Park, and follows the kidnapping of a police commissioner's son. Bill Murray also stars as Arthur Howitzer Jr., the paper's editor, while Owen Wilson appears in a short segment that introduces the film's fictional setting of Ennui-sur-Blasé.
The project was first mentioned in August 2018 as an untitled musical set after World War II. That December, the film was officially announced, with Anderson calling it a "love letter to journalists". Filming took place between November 2018 and March 2019, with cinematographer Robert D. Yeoman, in the city of Angoulême, France. In post-production, editing was completed by Andrew Weisblum and the score was composed by Alexandre Desplat.
Following a delay from 2020, The French Dispatch premiered at the Cannes Film Festival on July 12, 2021, and was theatrically released in the United States by Searchlight Pictures on October 22, 2021.[7] It received generally positive reviews, with praise for its score, production design, and performances. It has grossed $46 million worldwide against its budget of $25 million.
Production[edit]
Background[edit]
The film has been described as "a love letter to journalists set at an outpost of an American newspaper in a fictional 20th-century French city", centering on four stories.[11] It brings to life a collection of tales published in the eponymous The French Dispatch, based in the fictional French city of Ennui-sur-Blasé.[12] The film is inspired by Anderson's love of The New Yorker, and some characters and events in the film are based on real-life equivalents from the magazine.[8] Arthur Howitzer Jr., the Kansas-born editor of the Dispatch, was based on the New Yorker founding editor Harold Ross, who came from Colorado. A. J. Liebling served as a secondary inspiration for the character.[8] The character Herbsaint Sazerac was inspired by the New Yorker writer Joseph Mitchell.[8] The food journalist Roebuck Wright was based on an amalgamation of James Baldwin, Liebling and Tennessee Williams.[8][13] The story "Revisions to a Manifesto" was inspired by Mavis Gallant's two-part article "The Events in May: A Paris Notebook", centering on the May 68 student protests.[8] "The Concrete Masterpiece" was inspired by the 1951 feature "The Days of Duveen", a six-part profile on art dealer Lord Duveen, upon which the character Julien Cadazio (played by Adrien Brody) is modeled.[8] The character Upshur "Maw" Clampette was based on art collector Dominique de Menil, and J.K.L. Berensen was inspired by art lecturer Rosamond Bernier.[13]
When speaking to French publication Charente Libre in April 2019, Anderson said: "The story is not easy to explain . . . [It's about an] American journalist based in France [who] creates his magazine. It is more a portrait of this man, of this journalist who fights to write what he wants to write. It's not a movie about freedom of the press, but when you talk about reporters you also talk about what's going on in the real world."[14]
Development and casting[edit]
In August 2018, it was reported Wes Anderson would write and direct an untitled musical film set in France, post World War II.[15] In November 2018, it was announced Jeremy Dawson would produce the film, with Tilda Swinton and Mathieu Amalric starring in the film. Dawson also confirmed the film is not a musical.[16] Additionally, Natalie Portman, Brad Pitt, and Léa Seydoux were rumored for roles in the film.[17] In December 2018, it was announced Anderson would write and direct the film, with Frances McDormand, Bill Murray, Benicio del Toro, and Jeffrey Wright; Seydoux was confirmed to star in the film alongside Swinton and Amalric, with Steven Rales producing under his Indian Paintbrush banner and Fox Searchlight Pictures distributing.[18] Timothée Chalamet's role was written with him in mind.[19]
Later that month, Lois Smith and Saoirse Ronan joined the cast.[20][21] In January 2019, Owen Wilson, Adrien Brody, Henry Winkler,[22] Willem Dafoe, Bob Balaban, Steve Park, Denis Ménochet, Lyna Khoudri, Alex Lawther,[23] Félix Moati, Benjamin Lavernhe, Guillaume Gallienne, and Cécile de France were cast.[24][25] Robert D. Yeoman served as the film's cinematographer.[26] In February 2019, it was announced Wally Wolodarsky, Fisher Stevens, Griffin Dunne, and Jason Schwartzman had joined the cast of the film.[27] In April 2019, Christoph Waltz, Rupert Friend, and Elisabeth Moss were cast.[28][29] Initially, Kate Winslet was also part of the cast, but had to exit the project to prepare for her next role in Ammonite.[30][31]
Cinematography[edit]
Director of photography Robert Yeoman shot The French Dispatch on 35 mm film using Kodak Vision3 200T 5213 for the color sequences, and Eastman Double-X 5222 for the black-and-white sequences, on Arricam Studio and Lite cameras provided by a studio in Paris.[35] Anderson preferred classic methods for shooting the scenes. Accordingly, the crew used scaffolding and hauled equipment on ropes, rather than a Technocrane; and golf carts for transporting cameras, rather than camera cars.[36] Most scenes were framed in 1.37:1 format (also known as Academy ratio), which Anderson used in his The Grand Budapest Hotel, and which was used for many of the French films that inspired The French Dispatch. Occasional scenes were shot in anamorphic format "mainly to make a bold dramatic statement", according to Yeoman.[35] French New Wave films were primary sources of inspiration for Yeoman's lighting; In Cold Blood (1967, shot by Conrad Hall) was another major reference.[35]
The animated segments were directed by Gwenn Germain, who previously worked on Anderson's Isle of Dogs.[37] As a nod to Angoulême's comic heritage, they were done entirely by local illustrators.[38] The team comprised a maximum of 15 people, with The Adventures of Tintin and Blake and Mortimer as their main inspirations. They took about seven months to complete.[37] The visual effects were done by the UK-based company Koala FX.[39]
Set design[edit]
Adam Stockhausen was responsible for the production design of The French Dispatch. He and his team began the scouting process using Google Maps, looking for promising locations before visiting them in person.[38] Stockhausen and Anderson envisioned a town which "felt like Paris but not as it is today – more a sort of memory of Paris, the Paris of Jacques Tati." The team eventually settled on Angoulême.[40] Stockhausen estimates that over 125 sets were constructed, most of them on location around Angoulême. A former felt factory was converted into a makeshift movie studio for the crew.[38] A real building in Angoulême was chosen as the basis for the Dispatch headquarters, enhanced with foreground sets and miniatures in order to create the symmetry typically seen in Anderson films.[41]
Rena DeAngelo was The French Dispatch's set decorator.[42] DeAngelo and Anderson sought inspiration from French films such as The Red Balloon, The 400 Blows, Bande à part and Vivre sa vie, and researched an extensive photo collection of Paris from the mid-1800s through the 1960s in order to "get a feeling of Paris when it was dirtier—still beautiful, but grimy."[42] DeAngelo and her team sourced the furniture for Le Sans Blague café from various places in Paris, and the coffee cups were specially made in Limoges, a city famous for its porcelain.[38] She also shopped once a month during filming at prop houses and flea markets in Le Mans, from which she sourced the furniture for Roebuck Wright's office. Much of the rest of the film's furniture came from a local estate liquidator in Angoulême.[38]
Rosenthaler's abstract paintings were created by the German-New Zealand visual artist (and Tilda Swinton's partner) Sandro Kopp in a three-month-long process.[43][44] Kopp cited the works of Frank Auerbach, Willem de Kooning, and Francis Bacon as references, while insisting that the paintings must be "idiosyncratic", and would not "look too much like the work of any living or dead painter".[43] He relocated to the French Dispatch set in Angoulême to create the paintings, working in the on-set studio.[43] Kopp also served as Tony Revolori's hand-double for the scenes where the young Rosenthaler is seen painting.[44]
Release[edit]
Premiere and theatrical release[edit]
In September 2019, Searchlight Pictures acquired distribution rights to the film.[52] It was set to premiere at the Cannes Film Festival on May 12, 2020, and get a wide release on July 24, but, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the festival was cancelled and the film was pulled from the schedule on April 3, 2020.[53][54] The film was rescheduled for release on October 16, 2020, before being pulled from the schedule again on July 23, 2020.[55][56]
The French Dispatch had its world premiere at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival.[57] It was screened at film festivals in Busan,[58] the Hamptons,[59] London,[60] Mill Valley,[61] Montclair,[62] New York City,[63][64] Twin Cities,[65] Philadelphia,[66] Wrocław,[67] San Diego,[68] and Zürich.[69] There was a surprise screening at the Telluride Film Festival.[70] The film was released in limited theaters on October 22, 2021, and received a wide release on October 29, 2021.[7]
Promotion[edit]
To promote the film, pop-up exhibitions with recreations of sets from the film emerged in Los Angeles, New York, and London for a limited time around the film's release date.[73][74] The London pop-up sported the storefront of the Le Sans Blague café's storefront, and housed several props from the film, including costumes, and Rosenthaler's mural.
Reception[edit]
Box office[edit]
The French Dispatch grossed $16.1 million in the United States and Canada, and $30.2 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $46.3 million.[5][6]
In its limited opening weekend, the film grossed $1.3 million from 52 theaters, for a per-venue average of $25,000, which was the best per-venue performance for a theatrically-released film up to that point of the COVID-19 pandemic;[75] the following month, Licorice Pizza had a per-venue average of $86,289.[76] The film expanded to 788 theaters the following weekend, and grossed $2.75 million.[77][78] It continued to expand in its third weekend, making $2.6 million from 1,205 theaters.[79]
Critical response[edit]
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a 75% approval rating based on 319 reviews, with an average score of 7.1/10; the site's "critics consensus" reads: "A loving ode to the spirit of journalism, The French Dispatch will be most enjoyed by fans of Wes Anderson's meticulously arranged aesthetic."[80] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 74 out of 100, based on 57 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[81]
David Rooney of The Hollywood Reporter praised the film's "hand-crafted visual delights and eccentric performances", and wrote: "While The French Dispatch might seem like an anthology of vignettes without a strong overarching theme, every moment is graced by Anderson's love for the written word and the oddball characters who dedicate their professional lives to it".[82] Writing for The Guardian, Peter Bradshaw said: "It might not be at the very zenith of what he can achieve but for sheer moment-by-moment pleasure, and for laughs, this is a treat".[83]
The French Dispatch was included in lists of the best films of the year from The New Yorker (#1),[84] The Forward (the best movie),[85] Cahiers du Cinéma (#6)[86] IndieWire (#6),[87] Esquire (#38),[88] New Musical Express (#11),[89] British Film Institute (#23)[90] and Vogue (unlisted).[91]