Train in vain

>> Wes Anderson offers more of the same, for better or worse, in The Darjeeling Limited

by MALCOLM FRASER

There was a time when it seemed that Wes Anderson could do no wrong. The layered beauty of his images, and the comic melancholy of his characters were wholly original and inspiring. Then there was the debacle of the incoherent, redundant and almost unanimously panned The Life Aquatic. Around the same time, Anderson became to the oh-ohs what Tarantino was to the ’90s: a filmmaker so widely (and poorly) imitated that through no fault of his own, his style became stale. Now, with The Darjeeling Limited, he’s done exactly what Tarantino did with Death Proof: unabashedly offered more of the same, love it or shove it.

The plot concerns three brothers—Francis (Owen Wilson), Peter (Adrien Brody) and Jack (Jason Schwartzman)—who take a train trip across India, on Wilson’s request, to repair their broken fraternal bonds. This description may be vague, but it’s impossible to go into much more detail—partly because a thorough account would be too elaborate, and partly because the family’s full story is never completely explained. Suffice to say that many antics, dysfunctional squabbling and a number of false endings ensue.

The Anderson honeymoon ended with Life Aquatic, but there are those of us who saw the warning signs with The Royal Tenenbaums, which was loved as universally as Aquatic was disdained. In Tenenbaums, as in the subsequent films, the characters begin as cartoonishly broad figures, human props in Anderson’s beautifully crafted compositions. The dialogue that comes out of their mouths is witty, but bears no relation whatsoever to real human conversation. Then at some point, Anderson suddenly asks us to care about these characters as human beings. Maybe it’s just me, but I find it hard to engage on a human level with a caricature, especially one with a complicated back story that’s never fleshed out.

The Darjeeling actors are all strong, and the Indian location seems perfect for Anderson’s visual style, every image crammed with colours and ornate decoration. Ultimately, those who enjoy everything Anderson does will undoubtedly love this. The rest of us may feel fascination and frustration in equal parts, along with a hope that one day he may regain the focus of his earlier films.

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