The Phoenician Scheme (2025)

 ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ½

The Phoenician Scheme (2025) – W. Anderson

I will have to watch this one again, having only seen it on my trans-Pacific flight to the USA on the tiny back-of-the-seat screen (possibly with an airline crash edited out).  However, even with these conditions, I’m confident that this is director Wes Anderson’s best feature since The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014). Although I enjoyed them well enough at the time, Asteroid City (2023) and The French Dispatch (2021) felt like a letdown. Here, Benicio del Toro stars as businessman Zsa-Zsa Korda, who may have a shady past and also the target of various attempts at his life (possibly leading to multiple airplane crashes, all survived). He is trying to put together the financing for one last engineering feat, which involves visiting a series of former business partners around the globe. Along with him are Mia Threapleton playing his daughter Liesl, now a nun, to whom he plans to bequeath his estate, and Michael Cera playing Bjorn, a tutor hired to teach him about insects. The characterisations (including from the many, often familiar bit players) are sublimely eccentric. Although not scaling the droll comedic peak that Grand Budapest conquered, Phoenician Scheme offers many amusing moments as Korda seeks to eliminate “the gap” in his financing. As could be expected, the art design, set decoration, and music (Alexandre Desplat, plus curated classical and jazz selections), are highly stylized and exquisite.  Recommended, particularly if you’ve more or less given up on Wes recently.