Grand Budapest Hotel Preview

The Grand Budapest Hotel is the latest creation from comedic genius Wes Anderson.  Anderson is also responsible for giving us the quirky and brilliantly written Moonrise Kingdom, Fantastic Mr. Fox, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, The Royal Tenenbaums, and Rushmore.  Anderson is up for 3 Oscars this year for The Grand Budapest Hotel: Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Writing.  Anderson was nominated for Best Writing for Moonrise Kingdom, Best Animated Feature Film for Fantastic Mr. Fox and for Best Writing for The Royal Tenenbaums, though he has yet to win an Oscar.

The Grand Budapest Hotel is the story of a famous concierge named M. Gustave H (Ralph Fiennes) at a luxurious hotel in the fictional Republic of Zubrowka and takes place between the first and second World Wars.  It is also the story of his protege Zero Moustafa (Tony Revolori), the Lobby Boy who eventually took over the hotel.

Anderson has assembled some of his band of merry men that you would see in many of his films: Bill Murray, Owen Wilson and Jason Schwartzman.  And, like many of his films, some of Hollywood's best talent have come out to take part in the merriment: F. Murray Abraham, Ralph Fiennes, Adrien Brody, Willem Dafoe, Jeff Goldblum and Edward Norton to name a few.  Another common trait of an Anderson masterpiece is to take what would normally be a dramatic topic and turn it on it's head with some smart and well-written comedy.  He's already tackled grief, loss, abandonment, sibling rivalry and other hard-hitting themes.  In The Grand Budapest Hotel, he adds murder to the list.

The preview is quick-witted and fast-paced as one would expect of Wes Anderson.  We are immediately introduced to Zero (the Lobby Boy in Training), M. Gustave H (the most accommodating concierge ever), The Grand Budapest Hotel (the finest hotel around that serves as the setting for the story), and that Gustave is being accused of murdering one of his guests.  It looks like another wonderfully and irreverently raucously riotous film in the repertoire of Anderson.  I've enjoyed all of his films, so I have no doubt I'll enjoy this one.  I'm predicting 4.0 stars: I'll think it well worth the price of admission and it has a good likelihood of making it to my home collection.  Am I right?  We shall see.