Oh to Be 11 Years Old Again (Would You Really Want To?)

Rating: 9/10 (28 November 2012)

A delicate, effervescent and, above all, sweet film from the formidable cinematic imagination of Wes Anderson.
A group of adults played by the likes of Bruce Willis, Edward Norton, Bill Murray, Frances McDormand and Tilda Swinton join forces (when they're not bickering with one another) to track down a pair of kids who have run off to be together. The film is about the pangs of adolescence and particularly the pangs of being labeled a "troubled" adolescent by an adult world that seems to have forgotten that it was once young too. But it's also about the struggles of being an adult role model, wanting to give kids a good example but not always being sure how. The movie illustrates how exhilarating, rewarding, exhausting and -- let's face it -- outright terrifying it is to be a parent or a guardian.
It's a beautiful film, one that anchors its facetious and sarcastic style with genuine and honest emotion. There are a couple of quite lovely moments, especially one between Frances McDormand and her daughter and another between Edward Norton's scout leader and one of the boys under his charge, that are tear inducing, but in a sweet, quiet way, not an obvious, shameless one.
And it's amazing to both look at and listen to, with some knock your socks off music scored by Alexandre Desplat.
Grade: A