Coming up on three decades into his filmmaking career, Wes Anderson has put such a distinctive stamp onto all of his movies that none of them could be mistaken as the work of anyone else. Nor could anyone adopt Anderson’s style without being labeled a copycat. Looking back on it, the director’s debut feature Bottle Rocket lays the groundwork for what would become the Wes Anderson brand.
Bottle Rocket was not a major movie when it received a limited theatrical release in early 1996. In fact, it was a decided financial failure that couldn’t even crack $1 million at the box office despite costing five times that to make. Nevertheless, as I was nearing the end of my days in film school, I remember it being greeted with quite a bit of buzz in those circles. In particular, the grad students at my university were very excited about it. Doing the math, it wouldn’t surprise me if the movie’s audience were almost entirely film students.
| Title: | Bottle Rocket |
| Year of Release: | 1996 |
| Director: | Wes Anderson |
| Watched On: | Blu-ray |
| Also Available On: | Hulu Max Various VOD rental and purchase platforms |
In a lot of ways, Bottle Rocket feels like a student film that managed to break through and get a real release into movie theaters where someone outside of the director’s own friends might see it. No doubt, that gave other aspiring young filmmakers a lot of hope for their own futures.
Anderson conceived Bottle Rocket during his time at the University of Texas, where he’d met his good friends Owen and Luke Wilson. He and Owen co-wrote a short film, which they shot in 1992 with both Wilson brothers starring. That short played at the Sundance Film Festival in 1994 and attracted the attention of producer James L. Brooks (Terms of Endearment, Broadcast News), who gave the group $5 million to expand it into a feature. That’s the sort of miraculous success story every film student dreams about, but very few actually achieve.
In both the short and the feature, the Wilsons star, not as brothers, but as a pair of dim-witted friends who strive to become infamous outlaw antiheroes. Dignan (Owen) has an ambitious 75-Year Plan mapping out how to accomplish this and strategizes their exploits in fastidious detail. The good-natured Anthony (Luke) isn’t nearly as invested in the plan as Dignan is, but mostly goes along with it because he has no better ideas for what to do with his life.
The boys start with a little breaking-and-entering, and when that goes well, progress to armed robbery, roping in a third friend to be their getaway driver. Far from some grandiose heists, their targets are hilariously small-time and their scores meager. Be that as it may, Dignan is juiced. He feels like a new John Dillinger or Clyde Barrow.
Now fugitives, the trio of course must get out of town and go on the lam. When their driver abandons them, Anthony and Dignan wind up stranded at a motel. Dignan uses the time to plot their next caper, one that will require the assistance of someone with actual criminal experience (a fun supporting turn from James Caan). Meanwhile, Anthony gets sidetracked falling in love with a pretty housekeeper who doesn’t speak much English (Lumi Cavazos, star of the 1992 art film sensation Like Water for Chocolate).
In comparison to Anderson’s later projects, Bottle Rocket is fairly modest in scope and clearly a formative effort. The story only has a small handful of characters, unlike the sprawling narratives of, for example, The Royal Tenenbaums or The Grand Budapest Hotel. Working on such a low budget, the director can’t indulge in the elaborate production design or world-building he’d later become known for. However, the film establishes many of the foundational elements of his style: the eccentric yet endearing characters, the off-kilter humor, the rigid formalist shot compositions, and the fetishistic obsession with trivial details. Bottle Rocket is the roadmap to Wes Anderson’s entire career.
Despite its inability to find an audience at the time, Bottle Rocket impressed enough key people in the industry – including Bill Murray and producer Joe Roth – to allow Anderson to make his follow-up project, Rushmore, which would turn out to be a huge breakthrough for him. It also got Owen Wilson and Luke Wilson acting gigs in mainstream productions like Anaconda and Scream 2, that would in turn lead to more work and soon shoot them both to stardom. By that measure, this little box office flop proved to be a very important film in the long run.
The Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection has a longstanding love affair with Wes Anderson, and will no doubt release all of the director’s films on disc eventually. (As I write this, we’re still waiting on Isle of Dogs, The French Dispatch, and his latest, Asteroid City.) While Anderson’s second feature, Rushmore, was the first to be inducted into the Collection with a DVD release in 2000, Bottle Rocket was the first Criterion put out on Blu-ray. In fact, it was among the initial wave of launch titles when Criterion moved to Blu-ray in December of 2008, alongside The Third Man, Chungking Express, and The Man Who Fell to Earth.
Criterion’s early Blu-rays were packaged in cardboard digipak cases, with slipcovers and insert booklets. The digipaks were generally unpopular with fans, and the label later reissued most of those titles in clear plastic keepcases.
According to the liner notes in the booklet, the video transfer for Bottle Rocket was supervised by Wes Anderson, cinematographer Robert Yeoman, and Criterion’s Lee Cline. Even with that being the case, it’s an older high-definition master and, looking at it with current standards, unfortunately doesn’t hold up especially well. Although the 1.85:1 image is fairly sharp and detailed, it also suffers clear signs of electronic sharpening, including edge enhancement halos and excessively noisy grain. It looks over-processed. Colors and contrast are also a bit flat. This would be a good candidate for a 4K remaster should Criterion decide to upgrade it for Ultra HD.
The DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 soundtrack has clear dialogue and a select few noticeable surround effects. but as a low-budget indie film, isn’t particularly aggressive or dynamic. The handful of gunshots sound quite weak. The musical score by Mark Mothersbaugh has a mild stereo presence. Licensed songs come across the best.
Bonus features include an audio commentary by Wes Anderson and Owen Wilson, a making-of documentary, deleted scenes, photos, and storyboards. Anderson’s original 13-minute Bottle Rocket short film from 1992 is here, as is a fairly interesting “Anamorphic Test” where Anderson and the Wilsons shot a practice scene in 2.35:1 widescreen as an experiment during pre-production, before ultimately settling on 1.85:1 as the movie’s aspect ratio. Two additional short films, one by Anderson’s friend and another by an art gallery owner, are a bit puzzling.
The enclosed booklet is cutely designed to look like Dignan’s “75-Year Plan” notebook, but takes the gag far enough to print all of its contents in a faux handwriting font that I found annoyingly difficult to read. Highlights of the booklet are a pair of appreciation essays by Martin Scorsese and producer James L. Brooks.
Related
- Wes Anderson
- Owen Wilson
- James Caan
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