Asteroid City

Asteroid City is colorful, original, and relentless. Its costuming is elegant, its tone shifts are palpable, and it features a stellar soundtrack that includes an original banjo number. There may be a lack of narrative depth, but the film is pleasing to the eyes and satisfying to the mind, as its main cast enjoys obvious arcs and frequent romantic payoffs.

As is common in Anderson’s style, Asteroid City’s dialogue is rapid-fire and unemotional, a tone that lends itself well to Augie and Midge, cool-headed, sharp-shooters at first glance who bond over photoshoots – Augie as the photographer, Midge as the subject – and their shared, aching grief. Together, they imbue Asteroid City with a sense of meaning — at least, somewhat. The truth is that, unlike some of Anderson’s masterpiece films (see Moonrise Kingdom, Rushmore, and The Grand Budapest Hotel), Asteroid City isn’t exactly sure what it wants to tell its audience. The pieces are on the table for profundity — an aching widower, grieving children, a movie star destroyed by the “violent men” in her life — and yet, the film didn’t strike me as profound at all. Asteroid City is certainly about the process of feeling and the journey to understanding grief, but it doesn’t have much to say.

In typical Andersonian fashion, Asteroid City falls neatly outside of generic lines, elegantly dodging the question of exactly what it wants to be. Advertised as something of a sci-fi flick, its actual science is practically nonexistent, amounting to little more than thrown jargon, laser guns, and dimwit technicians in lab coats. In recent weeks, Asteroid City reviewers have taken to the term dramedy, with New York Times staff writers describing it as “comic and often wry” with “the soul of a tragedy.” The entire film is, indeed, permeated by a painful, indomitable sadness, which is beautified and filled with irony against colorful sets and the bright-desert sun.

Like all Anderson films, Asteroid City is a treat for the eyes, with a distinct color scheme (blues, oranges, whites), visual motifs, and old-school pop culture references that become treasure hunts by the movie’s end (keep an eye out for Road Runner and Superman). Romance abounds, as the film’s main cast finds themselves falling in unmistakable love as the story progresses. Although some of these threads end unsatisfyingly, they make for fun moments and a likable cast of characters.

At a pivotal point in Asteroid City’s second-half, playwright Conrad Earp remarks that he never figured out what his arguably most important scene means. When he’s asked, he’s not dismissive or defensive, but rather, eager to find something important to say — something that, in that instant, seems to be just beyond his reach. While this comment is charming,it’s also telling – because, in that scene, Earp is Anderson. Asteroid City’s issue isn’t that it lacks finesse or thought — it’s that the careful masterwork which went into creating the film’s aesthetic never came together for its ultimate meaning.