Wes Anderson's whimsical crack at epic form, a continuation of his now patented style, persists, perhaps compulsively, in his adaptation of Roald Dahl's classic story "Poison," its third time on the small screen, and, one hopes, its last.
Needless to say, he had to try something different the third time round, after the master of suspense had put his own stamp on it in 1958. That's a hard act to follow, considering a generation recalls it fondly, one assumes even Anderson.
Anyhow suspense isn't Anderson's thing. In a way it's refreshing that a young director is disinclined to emulate Hitchcock. Instead, it's interesting that he chooses to acknowledge in his work the artifice of its form, calling attention to its representation of reality, and abandoning altogether the suspension of disbelief. Using this distancing effect, as he does in these films of Dahl's stories, goes counter to the very nature of film itself, since the first time audiences faced a loaded gun watching "The Great Train Robbery."
Interesting, yes, even watchable, to a point (17 minutes is tolerable). But does it do justice to Dahl's fiction? Maybe Anderson places too much emphasis on the idiosyncratic qualities of Dahl and not enough on the substance, which is overtaken, finally, by all the gimmickry. After all, "Poison" is really about blatant racism during Britain's imperial rule in India, than a "venomous" krait, as Anderson's readjustment of Dahl's rather halfhearted ending infers. Reality does matter in the end, so why avoid it?
Needless to say, he had to try something different the third time round, after the master of suspense had put his own stamp on it in 1958. That's a hard act to follow, considering a generation recalls it fondly, one assumes even Anderson.
Anyhow suspense isn't Anderson's thing. In a way it's refreshing that a young director is disinclined to emulate Hitchcock. Instead, it's interesting that he chooses to acknowledge in his work the artifice of its form, calling attention to its representation of reality, and abandoning altogether the suspension of disbelief. Using this distancing effect, as he does in these films of Dahl's stories, goes counter to the very nature of film itself, since the first time audiences faced a loaded gun watching "The Great Train Robbery."
Interesting, yes, even watchable, to a point (17 minutes is tolerable). But does it do justice to Dahl's fiction? Maybe Anderson places too much emphasis on the idiosyncratic qualities of Dahl and not enough on the substance, which is overtaken, finally, by all the gimmickry. After all, "Poison" is really about blatant racism during Britain's imperial rule in India, than a "venomous" krait, as Anderson's readjustment of Dahl's rather halfhearted ending infers. Reality does matter in the end, so why avoid it?