In what sounds like a headline fit for The Onion, Wes Anderson claims he doesn’t have an aesthetic when it comes to filmmaking. That is an absurd statement.
In a recent interview with Deadline, Anderson commented on his style of filmmaking, which hit its stylized stride with 2001’s The Royal Tenenbaums and has only been accentuated, more like persistently controlled, in ensuing years.
“Well, I don’t have an aesthetic,” Anderson began. Stunned by that assertion, the Deadline writer replied that some people would likely disagree with that statement, Anderson elaborated:
I totally understand! Even I can say, ‘Well, yes, I can tell that’s the same person.’ But it’s an invention, you know? What I was doing in Bottle Rocket was what I had. That was my aesthetic. And it changed in this one. And, every time, so much of the next movie is informed by something we did in the one before. Like, people often refer to me doing these kinds of dolly shots, and Asteroid City begins with a long one. We go from one place to the next, and we run around. It’s a certain kind of way to film a sequence that is not so typical for everybody. And I do it a lot.
After pointing to a specific example from Rushmore, Anderson concluded, “You know, you find the thing you like, and then you do it again, do it a bit differently, and then you say, ‘OK, I’m going to try a different thing here. I’ll go another direction.'”
Wes Anderson’s style is as recognizable as they come. No other filmmaker could come up with the minutiae attention-to-detail. The obsessively constructed frames, and solid colours synonymous with his works. Anderson’s flat space camera moves, symmetrical compositions, and handmade art direction are definitely a singular aesthetic.
His films have such a distinctive quality that they’ve provoked a whole movement of parodies on TikTok. Anderson has even called his films "self-contained worlds.”
So, what gives? Why does Anderson believe he has no aesthetic? He’s not been shy in trying to distance himself from the TikTok videos using his style of filmmaking, and has even said that he refuses to watch these videos. Maybe he’s just irked by them.
Cory Finley, a talented filmmaker, has directed three films so far: "Thoroughbreds" (2017), "Bad Education” (2020), and "Landscape with Invisible Hand.”