Missed the Oscar awards (also missed the Super Bowl, am also boycotting AWP — go figure), so I was a little slow in putting two and two together. Wes Anderson’s movie The Grand Hotel Budapest was nominated for Best Picture but only managed to win the Costume Design, Make-Up, Production Design and Music categories. The “only managed to win” is meant ironically because, of course, most of us would imagine life complete with an Oscar in Costume Design (okay, well maybe that’s hyperbole).
In any case, what is cool is that our inimitable movie guy, Rob Gray, did a lovely little piece two years ago on Wes Anderson’s short film “Hotel Chevalier,” which, when you watch the opening, bears an uncanny resemblance to the front desk scenes in The Grand Hotel Budapest. As Rob observed at the time, all Anderson’s films come from the same palate. Fascinating to see and think about.
Wes Anderson’s short film “Hotel Chevalier” is a lean, bruised and naked tale in a Paris hotel room. Anderson shot the short with his own funds (and the actors, Natalie Portman and Jason Schwartzman, donated their time) two years prior to his feature The Darjeeling Limited but it was often screened at the same time and is referred to by many as a prologue to that feature film that followed it (as mentioned in this previous NC at the Movies entry). The two are aesthetically consistent, but that’s not surprising as most of Anderson’s films belong to the same visual palate and characters seem descended from the same family tree.
Click here to watch the movie and read the rest at NC at the Movies.