Wes Anderson

An auteur with a penchant for eccentric characters, conversational scripts, highly symmetrical photography, British Invasion-heavy soundtracks, and eye-catching color schemes, Wes Anderson is one of the most renowned and accomplished torchbearers of American indie cinema. While Anderson's low-key 1996 feature-length debut, Bottle Rocket, gained a cult following and kick-started the careers of actors Owen and Luke Wilson, his playful and inspired follow-up, Rushmore, was a comedic masterpiece, with pitch-perfect performances by newcomer Jason Schwartzman and a reinvigorated Bill Murray. After the uneven-yet-intriguing Royal Tenenbaums, subsequent productions yielded diminishing returns, with Anderson's trademark quirky narratives threatening to outshine his characters and ultimately his films. He eventually remedied this by turning to someone else's story, returning to fine form with Fantastic Mr. Fox, his initial foray into stop-motion animation. Surprisingly enough, this adaptation of Roald Dahl's children's tale--despite its utter absence of onscreen actors and the director's alleged absence in the studio--proved to be an ideal match with Anderson's very specific set of aesthetics, yielding an unexpected and overdue artistic triumph.