Wes Anderson

Wesley Wales Anderson (born May 1, 1969, in Houston, Texas) is an American writer, producer, and director of films and commercials. He attended St. John's School, a private school in Houston, which was later used as a filming location for Rushmore. Anderson then studied philosophy at the University of Texas, where he met future collaborator Owen Wilson.

Acclaim and criticism

Anderson is unique among filmmakers in that his are the only films guaranteed a spot on the prestigious Criterion Collection DVD label. Both the Tenenbaums and Life Aquatic discs were in preparation as the films themselves were in production; usually, it is only after a film has been released that it may be selected as meriting the Criterion spine label.

Related Topics:
Criterion Collection - DVD

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Critical reviews of Anderson's work, however, have been decidedly mixed. Especially after Rushmore, some critics have found the filmmaker's idiosyncratic tastes for acting and visual presentation to be overwrought, pretentious, and ultimately devoid of emotional substance. A common theme among reviews of Anderson's work is that he has a style which the viewer either buys into and loves, or does not accept and instead finds annoying and overly precious.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

In an article titled "The Next Scorsese" http://www.esquire.com/features/articles/2000/scorsese/000301_mfe_scorsese_wanderson.html for the March 2000 edition of Esquire, director Martin Scorsese himself nominated Wes Anderson http://www.esquire.com/features/articles/2000/scorsese/index.html as "The Next Scorsese", and has elsewhere pinned Anderson as his favorite new director of the 1990s.

Related Topics:
Esquire - Martin Scorsese

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~