Bob,
Hope this helps.
It's another moviegoer's reaction to an advance viewing of Bill's upcoming movie (hopefully it'll release in Dec 04). No spoilers here.
I pasted it from aintitcoolnews.com
"The Life Aquatic
All of Wes Anderson’s movies are great, and "The Life Aquatic" is my favorite to date – mostly because Anderson has finally situated centerstage longtime collaborator and comedy ubergenius Bill Murray.
Murray is a riot as Steve Zissou, a vain, disreputable American version of Jacques Cousteau who makes self-important, vaguely fraudulent documentaries about his own underwater adventuring. Zissou is out to revive his career by confronting the aquatic monster that lunched on Zissou’s elderly partner. Along the way, there are semi-unanticipated obstacles.
The underlying sadness one always associates with Anderson’s films still lurks, but this boasts the silliest comedy of any of the director’s efforts to date. Silly films are good if they’re funny, and, make no mistake, “The Life Aquatic” is fricking hilarious.
The film constitues an absolute career peak for Willem DaFoe, who seems to be rapidly morphing into David Letterman’s old recurring sidekick Brother Theodore. DaFoe has never been, and almost certainly will never be, as entertaining as he is as Klaus Daimler, Zissou’s relentlessly insecure German second-in-command.
Even beyond Zissou and Daimler, the film contains inspired characters numerous enough to fill four or five movies. I particularly enjoyed the always-reliable Jeff Goldblum, very funny as Zissou’s oblivious and much-better-financed oceanographic and romantic rival. Cate Blanchett has never been cuter as the skeptical and disparaging journalist Zissou covets. Owen Wilson pulls many a sneaky laugh out of Ned Plympton, an adoring Zissou fan who may actually be the filmmaker’s son.
Much (most?) of the film unfurls as a Zissou-made documentary, allowing for unusually propulsive pacing, agreeably abrupt transitions and much hilarious captioning.
Longtime Anderson fans will enjoy “Bottle Rocket” flashbacks as Zissou turns clumsy action hero at key junctures. The beach-storming sequences suggest what “Charlie’s Angels” might have been like had Bosley been dispatched to do all the rescuing.
Per Anderson tradition, the music is wonderful, particularly the Devo tune that accompanies one extremely gratifyingly comic montage.
"Life Aquatic" is another one I'm keen to see again, like now, but it won't have a proper run in cinemas until year's end.
****1/2"
that TLA's Dec date release has been removed from movie release sites. 