Wes Anderson 'Spoils' Asteroid City In The Opening Credits - And That's A Good Thing
It doesn't take long for people to realize that they are watching a Wes Anderson movie. From the radiant colors, Anderson's predilection for specific camera angles, and quirky characters with distinct manners of dialogue, fans of Anderson movies know exactly what kind of film they are walking into.
Anderson's latest venture, "Asteroid City," is full of Hollywood A-listers like Tom Hanks, Scarlett Johansson, Edward Norton, and Tilda Swinton just to name a few, and it is all about a scientific gathering that gets quarantined due to an encounter with an alien. However, it seems as if the person playing the alien is revealed during the earliest moments of the movie.
Apparently, Jeff Goldblum will actually be playing the alien in "Asteroid City," and it appears as if this was very much an intentional decision to acknowledge right away. In an interview with The Washington Post, Anderson explained, "We naturally were debating whether this is necessary in the opening credits. I said, 'You know, it's a good thing.' It's a little foreshadowing. In our story, it's not an expansive role. But part of what the movie is to me and to Roman, it has something to do with actors and this strange thing that they do. What does it mean when you give a performance? If somebody has probably written something and then you study it and learn and you have an interpretation."
By exposing Goldblum's character as an alien, audiences have something else to look for
Wes Anderson continued his thoughts, stating that revealing an actor as the alien provides a complexity to the character that AI could never generate. "And then you take a bunch of people taking themselves and putting themselves in the movie," Anderson said. "They have their faces and their voices, and they're more complex than anything than even the AI is going to come up with. The AI has to know them to invent them. They do all these emotional things that are usually a mystery to me. I usually stand back and watch and it's always quite moving."
Anderson's words here definitely echo a certain aspect of acting, and it seems as if his interpretation of what acting actually does to movies is probably why he has a tendency to work with the same individuals. After a couple of movies, Anderson understands his actors' nuances and idiosyncrasies, which is most likely why he chose to make Jeff Goldblum his alien. Joking aside, it makes perfect sense as to why Anderson chose to reveal Goldblum's alien status, and it is because it removes an element of surprise and replaces it with anticipation.
Anderson movies usually march to the beat of their own drum and removing any sort of "who is the alien" vibe probably gives the actors much more breathing room with their own takes. Ultimately, one can never go wrong with allowing Goldblum to be an alien, and if anything, this may draw even more people to the theaters to check out "Asteroid City."