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Harvey Karten's Reviews

Review: The Darjeeling Limited

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#1 of 1 Posted 9/30/07 6:28 PM

From harveykarten Posts 798 Last Feb-7
To All [Msg # 22667.1 ]

THE DARJEELING LIMITED

Reviewed for CompuServe by Harvey S. Karten
Fox Searchlight
Grade: B
Directed by:    Wes Anderson
Written By: Wes Anderson, Roman Coppola, Jason Schwartzman
Cast:   Owen Wilson, Adrien Brody, Jason Schwartzman, Amara Karan, Wally Wolodarsky, Waris Ahluwalia, Irfan Khan, Barbet Schroeder, Camilla Rutherford, Bill Murray, Anjelica Huston
Screened at: Union Square, NYC, 9/29/07
Opens: September 29, 2007

Some tour advisers counsel travelers to take luggage according to the length of their trip. The longer the trip, the less luggage, paradoxically. (Think about this!) A trio who ignore this advice are Francis (Owen Wilson), Peter (Adrien Brody), and Jack (Jason Schwartzman), but the exquisite, matching, Louis Vuitton luggage that they heap one atop the other are really meant metaphorically, to symbolize the huge load of emotional baggage that the three brothers are schlepping even when they’re going outside for a smoke. Their trip is a long one indeed, far away. They’re India, their purpose allegedly to bond once again after having not talked to one another since their dad’s funeral the year previous. We find out that one of the three, without telling his siblings, has conned the two into going with him to India to hook up with their eccentric mother, Patricia (Anjelica Huston), who has become a nun on the subcontinent and who does not even want to see her sons.

“The Darjeeling Limited,” named for the train they take on their leisurely trip across the Indian landscape, is a shaggy dog tale that bears the imprimatur of its director, Wes Anderson. Anderson, the thirty-nine year old Texas born director, producer and writer of films and commercials, is best known for personal films inspired by the French New Wave such as the flaccid “The Life Aquatic with Steve Zisson,” about a Jacques Cousteau-like figure who encounters a young man who may or may not be his son, and a stunning “Rushmore,” about a prep school oddball who falls in love with a first-grade teacher. Like these predecessors, “Darjeeling” is full of Anderson’s love for detail, for observations of quirky, human beings, and for humor that creeps up cumulatively on the audience.

Featuring Wes Anderson regulars like Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, Jason Schwartzman (who co-scripted the movie) and Anjelica Huston, the film introduces us to the three brothers, each with a distinctive trait or problem he must resolve. Peter, for example, wants to divorce his wife but the situation is complicated by her pregnancy. Francis is a control freak who insists on ordering for all three in the train’s first-class restaurant compartment and on holding all the group’s passports for safekeeping. He even has an assistant, riding in another car, Brendan (Willy Wolodarsky), who prepares and laminates each day’s itinerary. Jack cannot get his mind off his girlfriend and the affairs she might be having in his absence, eavesdropping on her answering machine. The philosophy underlying the trip is that the brothers can forge a new personal alliance by way of a journey through a nation considered by some to be the most spiritual–the land of gurus and fakirs and a multiplicity of gods. As they ride in the train’s first-class compartment, one of the brothers will have a quickie with an attendant (Amara Karan), all will visit an array of temples and bazaars, and in the picture’s most melodramatic action scene, they will risk their lives spontaneously to save a group of kids whose raft has overturned in the rapids.

These are obviously rich guys who can afford to ignore the problems of the world and insulate themselves in the Indian cocoon. The probably means to evoke audience smiles rather than guffaws (Anderson is not the Farrelly brothers) while perhaps bringing a few tears to eyes of audience members who can relate to the difficulties that they have had with close members of their own families. It’s a modest effort, the sort of film that would be picked up by the festivals (in fact it was the opening-night selection at the prestigious New York Film Festival), but as the title might imply, it has limited appeal perhaps targeted to an audience who even know what darjeeling tea happens to be.

Rated R.    91 minutes   © 2007 by Harvey Karten Member: NY Film Critics Online

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Harvey Karten's Reviews

Review: The Darjeeling Limited

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