"Moonrise Kingdom" (***)
Directed by Wes Anderson
For once I don't feel like Wes Anderson has lied to me again. Not that any of his previous films have claimed to be anything else, but it so often feels like his stories pitch notions that they have no intention of keeping. Wes is all about the innocent beauty of romance in the context of a not-so-innocent world, or at least that's how it often seems. I walked into "Moonrise Kingdom" like so many else did, expecting more of the quirky, entertaining, but still hollow and dishonest brand that Wes has been pushing across six previous features. What surprised and delighted me about the film is that it's still Wes, but he doesn't seem to faking sincerity this time around.
Taking a tweedy and knowingly ridiculous interpretation of a chaotic ex-military romance, Wes brings some actually true conflicts about adulthood, life, violence, and love to a much younger setting. In embracing the youth of his brand, rather than run off with adults who act like children, which serves ever so annoyingly in nearly all of his previous film, Wes taps something that doesn't feel dishonest. The amazing beauty that his team is often capable of constructing can finally be given the chance for the audience to drink it in. It's not a lie, and the emotions that the characters feel aren't an obvious facade. This is a fascinating debut for Kara Hayward, a place where Edward Norton can finally sink into something fresh again, a project for Tilda Swinton to wax ridiculous playing "Social Services", and honestly a career-best performance from Bruce Willis, if that means anything. It's a thing of true beauty, and one that Wes is sadly not likely to achieve again.
