Review of Rushmore (1998) by Stuart K — 24 Mar 2011

The second film by Wes Anderson, made soon after the critical acclaim his debut Bottle Rocket (1996) received, this helped cement Anderson as one of the most promising independent filmmakers of recent times.

This is one about trying to fit in, and it's got all of Anderson's offbeat flourishes that we've come to expect from him. Set somewhere in Texas, at the prestigous Rushmore academy. The film focuses on eccentric 15 year old student Max Fischer (Jason Schwartzman, his film debut and a very good one too), who has been at the academy for 4 years, and has taken part in alot of extracurricular activities, which takes up nearly all of his time at the school, which is affecting his grades badly.

The headmaster Dr. Guggenheim (Brian Cox), theatens to expel Fischer unless he improves his grades, as he does alot of big scale projects without the approval of the school. However, Fischer ends up falling for widowed teacher Rosemary Cross (Olivia Williams), who in turn falls for Herman Blume (Bill Murray), an unhappy industrialist who has a slight friendship with Max.

It's very offbeat and quirky, but that's what we've come to expect from Anderson, and the script by Anderson and Owen Wilson has some brilliant dialogue and good moments of detail. Schwartzman shows such confidence in his debut, you'd swear he had years of experience, and Murray has worked with Anderson ever since.