RATING
Director(s): Wes Anderson
Country: United States
Author: Wes Anderson, Roman Coppola
Actor(s): Benicio Del Toro, Mia Threapleton, Michael Cera
Written by Tom Augustine
The Phoenician Scheme’s impermeable, cockroach-like protagonist, Zsa Zsa Korda (Benicio Del Toro), almost certainly takes his name from Alexander Korda, the Hungarian film producer, director and screenwriter partially responsible for such British cinematic touchstones as The Third Man, The Private Life of Henry VIII, The Thief of Baghdad and David Lean’s Summertime. A great clue lies within the film — like the Korda of The Phoenician Scheme, Alexander Korda was married and divorced three times. Korda rose to prominence in the silent era, and remains a hallowed figure in the halls of British cinema. The Korda of Wes Anderson’s film is not a film producer, but a cutthroat industrialist — he is no architect, but has a grand project, one that he estimates will pay dividends to its investors over the course of the next hundred-and-fifty years. And yet, as The Phoenician Scheme unfolds, this errant, amoral capitalist pursues the project (which will originate in the fictional, Egypt-coded nation of Phoenicia — references to the post-World War II Western industrial-colonial project are amply laid on throughout the film) with the fervour and intensity of an artist (architectural or otherwise) trying to get a passion project off the ground. In this sense The Phoenician Scheme bears parallels to Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist, another film textually concerned with a major Hungarian figure in 20th Century history (that film’s protagonist is even named László, Korda’s original moniker before his move to the UK). Both films are, for all intents and purposes, about the filmmaking process, making Phoenician a third exercise in self-reflexivity alongside recent Anderson works The French Dispatch and Asteroid City.
These three films contain a true postmodernism that is too easily dismissed as head-in-the-sand myopia, despite the soulfulness of Anderson remaining a constant, thrumming presence, even as it becomes more fortified within the auteur’s robust directorial style. I mention this because of the facetious, consistent assertion that Anderson’s films have become monuments to their own aesthetic in the years since his masterpiece The Grand Budapest Hotel, empty dalliances in Anderson’s hyper-specific mode of construction, uninterested in the world beyond their own immaculately manicured walls. It’s a bizarre argument, really — Anderson, as much as any other auteur, uses his style to genuinely express himself, in a way that can sometimes be hard to parse, or easy to misinterpret. But there’s a purity to that expression, and plenty of fuel for the thematic fire for those willing to delve. Political allusions circle The Phoenician Scheme with a ferocity rare for Anderson, and seemingly in tune with the current climate. To call The Phoenician Scheme a strictly anti-capitalist film feels like a misread — it’s not a film that’s enamoured with or in support of the concept, true, but the fact that Anderson feels compelled to trace the slow redemption of the businessman at its centre feels significant. As with other patriarchal figures in Anderson’s oeuvre, from Royal Tenenbaum to Steve Zissou to Mr Fox, there’s little nobility in Korda or in his mission, but there’s a dignity to their single-minded pursuits and the sacrifices they make that is surely resonant to those familiar with the draining, often-doomed efforts of getting a film off the ground. Much of The Phoenician Scheme is concerned with Korda’s dogged pursuit of ‘gap financing’ for the completion of the project, engaging with any number of shady associates to try and lock down the funds needed. It’s a term well-known enough in the film industry to be a dog-whistle of sorts, revealing Anderson’s true intentions.
A twitchy, unsettled feeling permeates The Phoenician Scheme, as it proceeds at a swift clip, barely pausing to catch breath. It’s probably the closest we’ll ever come to an Anderson action-thriller, not least in sequences of airborne strife (Korda is infamous for being unkillable, having survived a huge number of attempted assassinations and surprisingly gory plane downings, including the one that starts the film). Running parallel to Korda’s business schemes is a slowly burgeoning relationship with his estranged daughter Liesl (Mia Threapleton, the daughter of Kate Winslet, whose nepotistic origins are of a fit with the film’s subject matter, and essentially serve to boost the fine work Threapleton delivers throughout). Liesl, one of ten siblings, is the only daughter, and is so disgusted by Korda’s dealings — which, he freely admits, includes the use of slave labour — that she has entered the convent. The ostensible reason for Korda’s reconnection is strategic — by placing his large estate in her hands he keeps it out of the mitts of his corporate nemeses (largely embodied here by Rupert Friend’s anonymous stuffed shirt). It becomes increasingly clear, though, that Korda is in desperate need of a human presence in his life, someone who cares for him and who he can in turn care about. The slow thawing of the relationship between the two is the most simple, emotional part of the film, but also the most rewarding: Anderson has explained that the relationship between father and daughter is channeled through his own experience having a daughter (as opposed to earlier films, that focused on the father-son dynamic), and is the core element of the film’s wonderful final scene, in which all the hubbub of the preceding ninety minutes falls away for a moment of quiet, humble connection.
A deceptively minor entry in the filmography of divisive auteur Wes Anderson, The Phoenician Scheme is a twitchy, surprisingly bitter cocktail that goes down smooth thanks to committed performances and a punchy pace. Anderson’s intricate house style is gently interrogated within the construction of a madcap crime caper, with telling flourishes of social commentary glinting through at opportune moments.
As is usually the case with an Anderson film, an exceptional A-list cast has been assembled — though ultimately the film is laser-focussed on the relationship between Korda and Liesl, as well as the burgeoning romance between Liesl and Korda’s tutor, Norwegian entomologist Bjorn (Michael Cera). Remarkably, this is the first time Cera and Anderson have collaborated, though their respective style and presence suggests a natural fit. This proves to be the truth, as Cera consistently delivers the most satisfying, humorous and likeable performance The Phoenican Scheme has to offer. Cera’s Bjorn evolves from meek comic relief to something like the film’s moral backbone, revealing hidden secrets along the way that allow Cera to flex his acting muscles, reminding us of his deceptively strong capabilities. The busyness of the rest of the film is owed in part to the sprawling nature of said cast, variously playing business associates, antagonists or communist rebels (Richard Ayaode, as the leader of this faction, serves as another highlight). The ensemble is populated by the usual suspects — Tom Hanks and Bryan Cranston as basketball-loving twin tycoons, Mathieu Almaric as ‘Marseille Bob’, an effete nightclub owner, Jeffrey Wright as a prickly business partner. It’s a hit-and-miss buffet, as with most late-era Anderson joints, where some character designs are more effective than others. Wright and Almaric are some of Anderson’s best late-era finds, and pop in small moments here; on the other hand, Riz Ahmed as ‘Prince Farouk’, a Saudi-style investor, and Scarlett Johansson as Hilda, Korda’s cousin, barely register. Benedict Cumberbatch, as the Colonel Kurtz-like estranged brother of Korda, waiting at the end of the journey for a major face-off, is a source of feline menace, utilising some truly bizarre hairstyling to his advantage to create a figure briefly, effectively monstrous.
As Anderson gets older, his films have noticeably calcified, his style becoming ever-more rigorous and hyper-specific. It can feel hard to penetrate, and plenty will find it impossibly precious. Part of the pleasure of these late-era films is to watch the way in which Anderson probes and interrogates his own fixations. A sudden moment of violence from Cumberbatch sees him break through the composed, centered framing he’s been trapped within, filling the frame and causing it to shake on its axis. In Korda’s regular recurring nightmare, he’s transported to the afterlife to face judgement (again, from regular Anderson players including Willem Dafoe, F Murray Abraham and, hilariously, Bill Murray as God), giving the auteur a chance to play with camera effects in a way that feels disorientingly fresh. Anderson is surely aware of the criticisms laid at his feet, and seems committed to doubling down — more than ever, his approach here, matching the generally bitter tone of the material, feels locked off, hermetically sealed. There’s a creeping coldness to some of the action here, prior to that meltingly warm final sequence, that flies in the face of claims that Anderson is a scion of twee, nothing more. In many ways, the works of his it most closely mirrors are the gloriously dark, nasty adaptations of Roald Dahl short stories he produced for Netflix, The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar, The Rat-catcher, The Swan and Poison. Like Dahl, there’s a childishness to Anderson’s public perception that the auteur seems very keen to shake, making the pair an ideal match. If The Phoenician Scheme had credited Dahl as a co-writer, I wouldn’t be surprised. Anderson is also keenly aware of the way in which his style has become a shorthand, and has been borrowed and stolen from in equal measure. One of the most bracing, heroic moments in The Phoenician Scheme: a note in the end credits, forbidding the film from being used to train AI. The mark of a true artist, no?
The Phoenician Scheme is in cinemas now.