Visually striking, wonderfully acted, emotionally touching.

Rating: 10/10 (29 December 2019)

The Russian army of World War One considered nostalgia an incurable contagious disease. A soldier who was considered to have "contracted" this "disease" was to be shot as if he was a deserter. If this principle was still the prevailing thought today, I, along with many of the characters of this masterful film, would meet the same fate as a Russian soldier.
M. Gustave H is a man so desperately trying to live his old world in a time that has so dramatically left him and his kind behind. Zero's visas MUST allow him passage, they always have.
Zero gave up a massive fortune to a presumably communist government, who possibly would have let him keep it otherwise, just to keep a reminder of his late beloved.
This movie is not what it seems. On the surface, this is a heist movie, a war movie, a comedy, and a picture of the old world where the rich still toured Europe. But this movie, while being all of that, is far, far more. It is a message that all things end. Zero's absolute desolation by the end of the film, his inability to move on from the "good times" before the war is a message to us to do just that. Do not linger on the good times until they are no longer. Move on.
Package all that into a beautifully framed package, and add some hilariously comedic dialogue, and you end up with the best movie of the decade.