Jade Carlile

Astroid City was the best movie I've watched this year so far. Wes Anderson is known for the gorgeous aesthetic that coats all his movies and they outdid themselves on this one. The set design was perfect, making you feel immersed in the town while also reminding you that it is in fact, a set. The costume design was fun and energetic, setting each character apart while also tying them together against their Southwestern background. The way that it's filmed, of course what Anderson is known for, is mesmerizing. There could be nothing technically going on on the screen, and yet I still stared intently. It was refreshing to have a movie trust me to be invested rather than patronizing me with constant stimulation of loud noises and flashy colors. And no body gives the soundtrack enough credit, but it was the perfect collection of songs to ground you in the setting, give you a false sense of bright cheeriness, but also leave you with a sense of unease like there's something you're not quite getting. "Not getting it" is the reaction I've seen a lot of people have. But I think they are ignoring the point. In the movie, the actor of the main character himself comments on that fact that even he doesn't get the point. He questions what it's about. And the response he gets is that it doesn't matter. The point is that art inherently has value, to put your best foot foward and enjoy it, regardless of if you have a fully fleshed out larger picture that you can definitively place your finger on. It promotes making a movie with a strategy informed by bottom up processing. Start with the characters, the set, the actions, and the result of that will be an amalgamation of your brain. The meaning will reveal itself. The movie is a movie about nothing, but it's also a movie about everything. It is meant to entertain and I was definitely entertained, it was hilarious and beautiful, and there is merit simply in that. Even if the movie did not hand me its message on a silver platter