When you watch a Wes Anderson film, you don’t look for ordinariness or convention. You look for new angles to tell intricate stories that seem weird and out of place but ultimately make sense.
Asteroid City did not disappoint in that aspect.
So by this paragraph you will know whether you want to read on or not. If you never liked Wes Anderson’s work, then it is time for you to move on from this article. However, if you are always intrigued by his unique angle of film making, then read on.
First of all, in Asteroid City, it is not about breaking the fourth wall anymore. Wes Anderson has done it so many times that he has to now rebuild narrative and physical walls, then tear them down to see whether there are new angles to explore. The application of both colour and black and white scenes denotes one of the few clear delineations of ‘worlds’ within its multiple worlds. The scenes in colour are the ones about the story that was written by the ‘real’ black and white world, including those ‘behind the scenes’ scenes e.g. with Magot Robbie and Adrien Broide. But then the colours in the story are washed out pastel colours to make it as unrealistic as possible. Props are not afraid to be shown as props, painted backgrounds are, well, painted backgrounds. Structures are mobile and then when characters in the ‘real world’ showed up in the ‘story’ portion, they were painted with colours - just look at the narrator scene. The only real connection within and outside of these multiple layers of worlds was Jason Schwartzman’s widower character Augie Steenbeck. However, even for him who ‘admitted’ that he doesn’t understand the play, which was said to be broadcasted as a TV show acted as a documentary about some fictional true events.
This is the level of absurdity that Asteroid City brings you.
However, what amazed me was that throughout the whole 105 minutes run time, I did not feel that I had lost the narrative or the ‘plot’. Perhaps that’s because I have watched too many of his works, and admired so many aspects of his works that I learnt how to go with the flow, and order just materialised in my brain. Or perhaps, he is one of the few directors who can create groundedness for abstract and absurd cinematic ideas. I personally tend to believe it was the second, then again, I am an admirer of his works too, so am I creating a cyclic view for Asteroid City that edges on absurdity?
With a stellar cast apart from the previously mentioned stars, you also have the likes of Tom Hanks, Steven Carell, Scarlet Johannson, Jeffrey Wright, Tilda Swinton, Bryan Cranston, Edward Norton etc. etc., you know that Asteroid City is not just about a particular cast member in reality, but an ensemble cast that can bring meaning to the words, sometimes I do not know whether they know why they are delivering. There were many times they said ‘I don’t know’ but did they really not know?
No matter how strange the structure for the Asteroid City is, I personally feel that there was a common theme running through all the characters - skirting around pain and grief. Augie Steenbeck, the main protagonist, didn't tell his kids about the death of their mother, while the kids already knew the fact that their mother died. Tom Hanks, who played the father in law, felt that pain will be less if he acknowledges the death of his daughter without acknowledging the loss of his daughter’s family. Scarlett Johansson’s famous actress uses the time in quarantine to avoid facing the truth of she doesn’t really know whether she was the real deal, while acting like a real deal in front of everyone. Tilda Swinton is suffering an existential crisis when what’s happening in front of her is beyond her scientific mind. A lot of times, it came down to the younger generation to actually point out the escapism in the adults.
Maybe Asteroid City is about avoiding pain and grief, maybe it is about our tendency of doing so as a way to survive - after all, everyone in the ‘story’ have no idea when is going to happen to them in the quarantine, including the authority, while the ‘real world’ characters are struggling to place meaning to the ‘work’, admitting they don’t understand the play, while placing abstract meaning to the ‘work’ like ‘infinity’, which really did not explain anything.
I don’t want to over-analyse Asteroid City, because I personally think that this would take the enjoyment out of it for me. At the end of the day, sometimes it is just great to immerse yourself in an open interpretation of life once in a while.
