| RAILWAY CHILDREN : Wes Anderson's 'The Darjeeling Limited' [7/10] : [for Tribune] |
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| Monday, 19 November 2007 | |
 "A motion picture studio is the biggest train set a boy ever had." - Orson Welles The Darjeeling Limited USA 2007 Starring : Owen Wilson, Adrien Brody, Jason Schwartzman Director : Wes Anderson showing with : Hotel Chevalier (short) USA 2007 Starring : Jason Schwartzman, Natalie Portman Director : Wes Anderson "IN the early seventies, I wanted to go to India. I thought, 'Imagine, just going up and down India on a train. Fantastic!'" The speaker is Paul Theroux, and the result of his whimsical impulse was a classic of modern travel-writing, The Great Railway Bazaar (1977). It's no stretch to imagine said volume being one of the inspirations for Wes Anderson's new film The Darjeeling Limited, which follows - in typically puckishly picaresque style - three well-heeled American brothers (Wilson, Brody, Schwartzman) as they journey across the sub-continent, mostly on trains, towards their mother's Himalayan-convent residence. This bickering fictional trio could easily be kin of the hyper-competitive, wildly-precocious Theroux brood - or of J D Salinger's Glass family, or the oddball clans from Anderson's own The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) and The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004). Indeed, Anderson seems to be operating on the principle of 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it.' Present are correct are his unmistakeably hyperreal visual style (bold but controlled colours; autistically symmetrical compositions; infinities of clutter; a particular 'sans-serif' font for text; moments of dreamy, exquisitely-choreographed slow-motion); numerous members of his clubbishly personal repertory-company; and a charmingly retro soundtrack (many cuts cheekily lifted from previous Indian pictures, by Satyajit Ray and Merchant/Ivory). These elements combine to winning effect in a picture that's less about plot (though there's at least one romance, at least one traumatic death) than the development of running jokes and unpredictable character-interactions along a certain fixed itinerary. Clocking in at barely 90 minutes (preceded by a winsome amuse-bouche short subtitled Part 1 of The Darjeeling Limited) the picture certainly doesn't outstay its welcome, maintaining a beguiling atmosphere of comic-romantic larkishness that only very occasionally threatens to curdle into excessively quirky/arch clever-cleverness. Though clearly as much of a boggle-eyed tourist as his characters, Anderson seems inspired and energised by the crazily colourful tumult of his surroundings here. And while Darjeeling might not prove everyone's cup of Assam, it's rather encouraging to see such an idiosyncratic talent sticking so defiantly to his creative guns - even if they are, on closer inspection, merely Fabergé toy-pistols. Neil Young written for the next issue of Tribune magazine  THE DARJEELING LIMITED : [7/10] : USA 07 : Wes ANDERSON : 104 mins including 13-minute short Hotel Chevalier (BBFC) seen at Vue cinema, Leicester : 6th Oct : press show (Cinemadays event) |
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