Review of The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004) by Tim S — 24 Jun 2014

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou is perhaps Wes Anderson's most-polarizing film to date. After earning nearly universal praise for his previous films Bottle Rocket, Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums, he took a slightly different direction with his next film, making it a bit more whimsical in nature, but still containing those real human elements that we all share.

The most important aspect of The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou is Bill Murray. Without his portrayal of the character, this film wouldn't be nearly as memorable as it is. He's the lynchpin for the rest of the cast's performances in the film, in my opinion.

The rest of the cast is pretty terrific, as one should expect, but again, they might not be as compelling without Bill Murray. Wes Anderson also chose to realize imaginary sea creatures using stop-motion animation, which some people felt took away from the reality of the situation at hand a bit too much (and also prefigured his interest in stop-motion with Fantastic Mr.

Fox). Personally, I found it to be deliberate and necessary. It's very easy to get caught up in the drama of the film, but the whimsy helps to soften the blow. It's almost like a bedtime story that's been made into a film, in a lot of ways.

It has that sort of feel to it to me. Even though there's a heartfelt story about an older man meeting his son for the first time and going through marital problems with his wife, I still feel like I'm reading the story out of a fairy tale book, and that's just wonderful.