Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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94 of 102 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Wonderfully Strange - Beautiful Colors - What Is Real?, June 30, 2005
I think if everyone would stop referring to the Wes Anderson movies as comedies we would all be better off. "The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou" is not about making the audience laugh. Yes, there are times you will laugh, but there are also times you will cringe, and there are other moments for just about everything else. What kind of movie is it? It really isn't something that can be given a single label. Yes, there are all kinds of jokes, but aren't they in the service of something more than simple laughs? Hearing David Bowie songs in Portuguese with an acoustic guitar is not only funny, it is kind of beautiful.
A simple joke is the name of Zissou's ship. The Belefonte is clearly a play on Cousteau's Calypso as are the crew's red knit caps. However, some of the humor is quite tough. Think of the scene with Jeff Goldblum's Alistair Hennessy playing cards with his pirate captors as Steve Zissou comes in the room. What follows is funny, but grim at the same time. Then there is the weird way the inside of the boat is portrayed in a cutaway set that looks fake and is meant to look fake. Notice that the science room is the smallest room on this research vessel. The Sauna is much bigger and all the rooms given over to film production constitute most of the ship.
This movie has a lot of fun with the artificial in documentaries and films. Even the scenes of creatures of the sea are often CGI creations that don't even try to look real. Heck, even the colors in the Zissou documentaries are supersaturated and look like they were done in different colors of ink rather than the ocean. How real is life when you are more concerned about getting everything shot with the right sound rather than living it? And how legitimate can a documentary be when it is cobbled together from a lot of staged shots and hosted by someone who really doesn't have a clue about the science behind what is being filmed?
All of the lead actors are terrific and Bill Murray leads the way as the weary and fading Steve Zissou. Everyone involved with Zissou has their own downward arc. Even the equipment is old and barely works. Tired helicopters are dangerous things.
Does the movie work? Maybe not. However, I find so much to watch and enjoy in each scene - even just the actions of the non-speaking characters - that I really enjoyed this movie. If you want to see something strangely beautiful, that plays with all kinds of notions of what is real and what is fake and has a lot of fun along the way, this might be something you would enjoy, although it is not for children.
I guess the kind of send up it is, even of Moby Dick, can be captured by then end title that expresses "gratitude to the Jacques Cousteau Society even though they had nothing to do with the making of the film." I like this kind of thing. Maybe you do to.
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127 of 156 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Zissou Life, January 9, 2005
Wes Anderson (The Royal Tenenbaums) is sowing some of his more artificial and creative wild oats in his latest, "The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou." I mean stop-motion clay animated sea horses and other assorted sea creatures? As well as a third wall removed set of Zissou's (Bill Murray) ship in which Anderson films the scenes there as if they were acts in a stage play?
It's strange, weird...and I've got to admit pretty wonderful.
Bill Murray plays Steve Zissou: a Jacques Cousteau sort of Sea Adventurer who, at the film's beginning, is down on his luck and has just lost a best friend to a so-called Jaguar Shark. One of the film's funniest scenes comes near the beginning when Zissou, in a conference swears to get even with the shark by finding and murdering it to avenge the death of his friend.
Owen Wilson is also on hand as Ned: a man who claims to be Zissou's son and once again we have this recurring theme in Anderson's work about lost, then regained fathers so prevalent in "The Royal Tenenbaums."
With a film so full of artifice, snotty-yet-funny wit and the king and queen of deadpan, Murray and Angelica Huston one would think that all of "The Aquatic Life" would be without an emotional life. But I found this film to have a very deep well of emotion if you are willing to wash down your emotion with large gulps of remorse and wry humor.
"The Life Aquatic" is a veritable beggar's banquet for the eyes and the ears (a Brazilian troubadour sings David Bowie songs throughout the film to underscore the drama) and though you sometimes think the whole ship is going to go over the edge artistically...it never does. It just sails along; the course set for parts unknown and uncharted.
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16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The 2-Disc Special Edition is the way to go!, May 10, 2005
There's always a certain amount of trepidation when a filmmaker like Wes Anderson, known for making intimate and personal films, starts making movies on a more ambitious scale - bigger budgets and movie stars in an attempt to appeal to larger audience - that he will lose all of the qualities that made his movies so interesting in the first place. Easily his most accomplished film, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou merges his stylized dialogue and quirky characters with elaborate sets and action set pieces in an exotic locale.
Anderson's career has been building up to this film. With The Royal Tenenbaums, Anderson was able to juggle a large cast of name stars while still maintaining his artistic integrity. With Life Aquatic, he continues to use stars but has upped the ante in production values and scope. However, he has not lost the intimate feeling that all of his movies possess. No matter how ambitious or big the scale, his films have hand-crafted feel to them. One gets the feeling that Anderson cares about every detail an every aspect and it is this personal touch that makes his movies so unique.
On the first DVD there are nine deleted scenes that feature some nice little bits of business between characters. There is nothing too significant for the most part and these were rightly cut out.
There is a theatrical trailer.
Also included is an audio commentary by Wes Anderson and co-screenwriter Noah Baumbach recorded at the restaurant in New York City where they worked on the screenplay. This is an engaging and thoughtful track as the two men touch upon the film's themes in an unpretentious way.
"Starz on the Set" is a 14-minute featurette. It is fairly standard press kit material as Anderson and the cast talk about the movie's plot and their characters with lots of clips from the film.
The second disc features a collection of stills taken during filming.
"The Look Aquatic" is a brief look at how the specific world that Anderson wanted to depict in his film was achieved, including the large set of the cross-section of the Zissou's ship, the Belafonte.
In "Creating a Scene," the cast talk about Anderson's style of filmmaking and how they contribute to it.
There is an excellent interview with long-time Anderson composer, Mark Mothersbaugh. Mothersbaugh talks about his transition from Devo to scoring movies and TV shows (his first gig was Pee-Wee's Playhouse) and gives insight into his creative process.
"Mondo Monda" is an amusing parody of an Italian talk show hosted by Antonio Monda who interviews Anderson and Baumbach in Italian while the two men struggle to understand what he's saying.
"Seu Jorge Performs David Bowie" features footage of the Brazilian recording artist performing ten Bowie songs in their entirety in Portuguese on the set of the film. Some were used in the film.
"Aquatic Life" is a fascinating look at how the undersea creatures were made via stop-motion animation by Henry Selick and his team and then inserted into the movie via computer.
The "Esteban" featurette follows Seymour Cassel around in Italy as he buys some cigars, talks about John Cassavetes and his movies and we see him being directed by Anderson on the underwater set of the movie.
The centerpiece of the supplemental material is "This is an Adventure," 51 minute documentary made by Albert Maysles, Antonio Ferrera and Matthew Prinzing during filming in 2003. We get to see various scenes being shot in this absorbing doc.
"Intern Video Journal" is a behind-the-scenes featurette shot and edited by "Intern #1" Matthew Gray Gubler. He also documents what the cast and crew do between takes - sleeping, playing foosball and basically messing around to alleviate the boredom.
There is also a gallery of paintings of the characters, logos and poster that were featured in the movie.
"Ned" is a brief interview with Owen Wilson as he talks about his character.
Also included is a look at the costumes designed for the movie.
Finally, there is a brief look at Cate Blanchett's character with the actress talking about how she incorporated her real-life pregnancy in the role.
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