moonrise kingdom: a new film by wes anderson

I just logged onto twitter to see that Wes Anderson was a trending topic. After some investigation, I discovered that the trailer for the director's newest film, Moonrise Kingdom, was released today (!!!). Co-written by Anderson and Roman Coppola (Sophia's brother), Moonrise Kingdom is about two young New Englanders who fall in love – it looks b-e-a-u-t-i-f-u-l. No word on a release date yet, but you better believe that I'll be seeing this on opening day :) 

339 convent avenue

Since viewing Wes Anderson’s The Royal Tenenbaums in 2001, I have been obsessed with that house. Not surprisingly, I could have almost cried with I came across this short film about the Harlem property on Kate’s tumblr yesterday. I love how Wes originally wanted to shoot the film on a sound state rather than in New York City because he wanted to create the perfect New York he’d envisioned as a child... I can certainly identify with that! The house is currently a private residence and an art gallery - think I can snag a dinner invitation someday?

a short story by wes anderson

A few days ago, I stumbled across this short story written by Wes Anderson while he was an undergrad. If you're a Wes Anderson fan, I think you'll get a kick out of reading it! Even back then you could tell that he had an eye for directing motion pictures-- in the story, he mentions how he would film a certain shot if it were a film. He also mentions Jack Kennedy and Debussy's La Mer-- two of my favorite things :) Thank you, Analecta, for scanning this in!

a sketch of margot tenenbaum's room

When Wes Anderson is writing, he keeps a notebook of ideas for sets, props and clothes  which he then incoporates into his scripts. “In the past,” Anderson says, “I have occasionally forgotten some of m y favorite ideas until it was too late—for example, after the movie is out on video.” In order to prevent this from happing on The Royal Tenenbaums (which Anderson admits, “contains more perhaps unnecessary visual detail than both of my previous films combined…”), he commissioned his brother, Eric, to create drawings from his notebooks. Wes used these drawings to convey his artistic vision for The Royal Tenenbaums to his production crew. The director notes, “…Eventually, [Eric’s] illustrations became standard equipment on the walls of the production offices and art department in the the notebooks of everyone on the crew—a sort of manual."

I include here Eric’s sketch of Margot Tenenbaum’s room. I swooned when I saw that amazing Scalamandré wallpaper drawn out! I swear, Wes Anderson could be one of the most successful interior designers of our time should he set out to do so.   

(drawing by Eric Anderson; scanned by moi)

Wes Anderson on NPR's Fresh Air

If you are like me and are obsessed with Wes Anderson, you might enjoy the interview he did last Friday with Terry Gross of NPR's Fresh Air about the making of Fantastic Mr. Fox. I find the film so fascinating because literally everything in the set was hand-crafted under Mr. Anderson's supervision. I'm dying to get my hands on the book he wrote about the behind-the-scenes process of making the film (thank you Samantha of post-grad hair cut for informing me that it even existed!). If you have yet to see the film, you're in luck-- it was just released on DVD last week. To be honest, I thought it was a little slow, but it's worth taking the time to watch because it is so aesthetically beautiful!

(photo courtesy of filmmaker magazine)

tim walker

If you haven't heard of photographer Tim Walker, you definitely know who he is. He's the mastermind behind those colorful, near-perfect ads for Juicy Couture. I stumbled across one of his images a few weeks ago was absolutely floored. This man is brilliant! The more I researched Mr. Walker, the more I fell in love with his work. The things I would do to have this man's vision! In 2008, The Design Museum in London curated a fantastic exhibit of Mr. Walker's work. Krisatomic has photos of the exhibit here.

I like the image above the best. It reminds me of this scene from The Royal Tenenbaums (my favorite movie!):