The Grand Budapest Hotel review

...need a place to check in? 

The Grand Budapest Hotel review – The Royal Tenenbaums, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, Fantastic Mr. Fox and The Darjeeling Limited are some of the movies helmed by Wes Anderson, the Director of The Grand Budapest Hotel. I have not watched any of it so I’m finally popped my Wes Anderson cherry with this flick. Reviews from his previous abovementioned films always pictured him as an eccentric director with a quirky sense of …well….direction. Was my ‘first time’ worth a watch? Let’s check into The Grand Budapest Hotel shall we? 

....5 stars? hmm.....

The show starts narrative style with an old Author (Tom Wilkinson) telling story about Zero Moustafa (Tony Revolori/F Murray Abraham) on how he inherited The Grand Budapest Hotel. He was the hotel’s lobby boy mentored by Gustave H (Ralph Fiennes) and they end up being good friends. Zero is well aware of Gustave being the hotel guest older, rich and blonde women’s special companion. Ehem. One of them, Madame D (Tilda Swinton) kicks the bucket suddenly and according to her Last Will and Testament leaves Gustav her most prized possession. A painting referred to as ‘Boy with Apple’. This action triggers series of unfortunate events for Gustav as Madame D’s disgruntled son, Dmitri (Adrien Brody) hires a private detective cum assassin Jopling (Willem Dafoe) to get back the painting from Gustav by all means necessary. Gustav is accused of killing Madame D and gets thrown into jail. He escapes with help of Zero and his baker girlfriend Agatha (Saoirse Ronan). Together they embark on their journey to prove Gustav innocence. Will they succeed?  

....#player nuff said 

One look at the poster and I went ‘Woahhhhhhhhh’. So many talented people in one movie. Kalah The Avengers wey! Will they be given enough line/time to shine? Main focus is of cause on Ralph Fiennes with his nose intact after battling with Harry Potter sans….errr…nose. His acting flair was top notch delivering line after line. While his side kick, Tony Revolori was equally gifted as well. Their chemistry was like a perfect combination of chemicals and comical. The rest of long list of actors was a joy to watch with each of them contributing different type of emotion to the movie. The best part of the movie for me was the background music! I wish I could watch the band perform. Each tune matched well with the scene. There was slight animatic style of filming which sets this movie apart from the rest out there.

....guess the actors.....

The peculiar storytelling way coupled with strange and out of the box direction will either tickle your fancy or make you cringe. I had mixed emotions. The fancy part was spotting which actor playing which part while the cringing was…well…I rather not dwell on it. Let’s just say it served little surprising scenes here and there. There was also blink-and-you-will-miss-it-scene which is total a NO NO in Malaysian cinema. Maybe since I watched the preview, that scene was not snipped. I just hope it won’t get blown-pun intended out of proposition. Weekend watching is recommended instead of after work view. The slow pace might turn you off from appreciating this unconventional picture. Check into The Grand Budapest Hotel and who knows you might just start checking other Wes Anderson offbeat trail.   

P/s - Thank you Churp Churp for the #Churprimere tickets!