Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs

This Is the One with the Most Supple Flow: Moonrise Kingdom

Movie

Moonrise Kingdom ****

thumbnail

Bookended by Benjamin Britten’s stirring “Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra,” this is the most subtle, supple, deftly stylized fantasy from Wes Anderson. It happens on an island where scouting sets the tone of life. Brainy, dreamy kids (Jared Gilman, Kara Hayward) flee camp and home to share a wee romance and adventures as they trek an old trail. It feels like James Thurber in a canoe looking for Huck Finn, or Groucho Marx chasing Tinkerbell. A terrific score and sly, softly whimsical design help the '30s-to-'60s ambience. Bored, jaded, or fussy adults are no match for bright kids, finding growth and liberation while still in the wonder spell of childhood, and the funny weirdness works. With Bill Murray, Ed Norton, Frances McDormand, Harvey Keitel, Bob Balaban.

Find showtimes

Wes Anderson’s Moonrise Kingdom opens with Benjamin Britten’s “Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra.” The tactic, like the music, is inspired. The kids of the Bishop family listen to the vinyl LP, and their imaginations already surpass their bored parents — weary, cheating Laura (Frances McDormand) and dud hubby Walt (Bill Murray), a man so irked by life that he vents his spleen on a tree.

Britten’s music, with its surging Baroque theme by Henry Purcell, becomes a tonic anthem of childhood freedom on the rise (reinforced amusingly by Mozart, Saint-Saëns, Schubert, Hank Williams, and Françoise Hardy). The key freedom-finders are bookish, innocently alluring Suzy Bishop (Kara Hayward), a dreamy nymphet, and the orphan Sam (Jared Gilman). Plucky, clever Sam smokes a pipe, takes no guff, and is treated as an outcast by his conformist scouting pack on an island where organized scouting seems to be the only industry.

Sponsored
Sponsored

Loner-dude Sam is by far the best scout. He sets off solo to walk the old Chickchaw Harvest Migration trail, despite a rising storm. Considered a runaway, he is pursued. Suzy finds him first, and their budding romance on the run is like a shared merit-badge project. It enlarges the film emotionally (it’s not quite kinky — more like watching Peter Pan fall for Tinkerbell).

Anderson shot their wilderness adventure in Rhode Island as a storybook vision. He uses images cut precisely to music, softly articulated colors, and split-screen shots like facing pages. A floating, deadpan comedy (more chuckles than guffaws), the movie is about dreamers who face and outrace their fears. At times it is almost a whimsical Yankee cousin of the children’s river trip in The Night of the Hunter, with monster Robert Mitchum replaced by the fussy spirit of Clifton Webb in Mr. Scoutmaster.

The grown-ups are way past childhood but not fully adult. Bruce Willis plays a perplexed, decent cop. Ed Norton is a scoutmaster given to comments such as, “Jiminy Cricket, he flew the coop!” Tilda Swinton is a mean social worker, and Harvey Keitel a scouting chief who looks like Stalin trying to be Teddy Roosevelt. The adult actors don’t have very much to do, but the elegant styling (a fabulism of intricate moods) and Anderson’s script with Roman Coppola binds the performers into a fine ensemble.

The time is the 1960s but with a ’20s-to-’50s aura. Moonrise Kingdom seems to evoke James Thurber and Richard Brautigan on a canoe trip, looking for Huck Finn. Of all the fastidiously quirky Anderson movies (Bottle Rocket, Rushmore, The Darjeeling Limited, etc.), this is the one with the most supple flow, the most subtle grip, the shaggiest rhythm of charm. Please, stay through the end credits.

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

Celebrate Holi, Borrego Springs Music Festival

Events March 23-March 27, 2024
Movie

Moonrise Kingdom ****

thumbnail

Bookended by Benjamin Britten’s stirring “Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra,” this is the most subtle, supple, deftly stylized fantasy from Wes Anderson. It happens on an island where scouting sets the tone of life. Brainy, dreamy kids (Jared Gilman, Kara Hayward) flee camp and home to share a wee romance and adventures as they trek an old trail. It feels like James Thurber in a canoe looking for Huck Finn, or Groucho Marx chasing Tinkerbell. A terrific score and sly, softly whimsical design help the '30s-to-'60s ambience. Bored, jaded, or fussy adults are no match for bright kids, finding growth and liberation while still in the wonder spell of childhood, and the funny weirdness works. With Bill Murray, Ed Norton, Frances McDormand, Harvey Keitel, Bob Balaban.

Find showtimes

Wes Anderson’s Moonrise Kingdom opens with Benjamin Britten’s “Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra.” The tactic, like the music, is inspired. The kids of the Bishop family listen to the vinyl LP, and their imaginations already surpass their bored parents — weary, cheating Laura (Frances McDormand) and dud hubby Walt (Bill Murray), a man so irked by life that he vents his spleen on a tree.

Britten’s music, with its surging Baroque theme by Henry Purcell, becomes a tonic anthem of childhood freedom on the rise (reinforced amusingly by Mozart, Saint-Saëns, Schubert, Hank Williams, and Françoise Hardy). The key freedom-finders are bookish, innocently alluring Suzy Bishop (Kara Hayward), a dreamy nymphet, and the orphan Sam (Jared Gilman). Plucky, clever Sam smokes a pipe, takes no guff, and is treated as an outcast by his conformist scouting pack on an island where organized scouting seems to be the only industry.

Sponsored
Sponsored

Loner-dude Sam is by far the best scout. He sets off solo to walk the old Chickchaw Harvest Migration trail, despite a rising storm. Considered a runaway, he is pursued. Suzy finds him first, and their budding romance on the run is like a shared merit-badge project. It enlarges the film emotionally (it’s not quite kinky — more like watching Peter Pan fall for Tinkerbell).

Anderson shot their wilderness adventure in Rhode Island as a storybook vision. He uses images cut precisely to music, softly articulated colors, and split-screen shots like facing pages. A floating, deadpan comedy (more chuckles than guffaws), the movie is about dreamers who face and outrace their fears. At times it is almost a whimsical Yankee cousin of the children’s river trip in The Night of the Hunter, with monster Robert Mitchum replaced by the fussy spirit of Clifton Webb in Mr. Scoutmaster.

The grown-ups are way past childhood but not fully adult. Bruce Willis plays a perplexed, decent cop. Ed Norton is a scoutmaster given to comments such as, “Jiminy Cricket, he flew the coop!” Tilda Swinton is a mean social worker, and Harvey Keitel a scouting chief who looks like Stalin trying to be Teddy Roosevelt. The adult actors don’t have very much to do, but the elegant styling (a fabulism of intricate moods) and Anderson’s script with Roman Coppola binds the performers into a fine ensemble.

The time is the 1960s but with a ’20s-to-’50s aura. Moonrise Kingdom seems to evoke James Thurber and Richard Brautigan on a canoe trip, looking for Huck Finn. Of all the fastidiously quirky Anderson movies (Bottle Rocket, Rushmore, The Darjeeling Limited, etc.), this is the one with the most supple flow, the most subtle grip, the shaggiest rhythm of charm. Please, stay through the end credits.

Comments
Sponsored
Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

Taco Taco Poway still has 99-cent fish tacos

Tacotopia prizewinner is well known among Powegians
Next Article

Looking back at race relations in Coronado

A former football player recalls the good and the bad
Comments
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed Big Screen — Movie commentary Blurt — Music's inside track Booze News — San Diego spirits Classical Music — Immortal beauty Classifieds — Free and easy Cover Stories — Front-page features Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts Feast! — Food & drink reviews Feature Stories — Local news & stories Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore From the Archives — Spotlight on the past Golden Dreams — Talk of the town The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it Letters — Our inbox Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news News Ticker — News & politics Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated Poetry — The old and the new Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers Reading — The hunt for intellectuals Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds SD on the QT — Almost factual news Sheep and Goats — Places of worship Special Issues — The best of Street Style — San Diego streets have style Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves Theater — On stage in San Diego this week Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads Your Week — Daily event picks
4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs
Close

Anchor ads are not supported on this page.