Buckaroo Banzai

07:06 Tuesday, 12 August 2025
Current Wx: Temp: 67.1°F Pressure: 1019hPa Humidity: 80% Wind: 6.06mph
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We finished a re-watch of Season 4 of Only Murders In the Building the other night, and browsing around Hulu for something else to watch I noticed Wes Anderson's The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, which I'd never seen before. So, into the queue it went, and we watched it last night.

I'm not a huge Wes Anderson fan. I'm conscious that I'm watching a Wes Anderson film the entire time, I never really get into the movie. I feel like I'm just watching a Wes Anderson performance, and he doesn't seem that interesting because it's always the same schtick. I never have that problem with Quentin Tarantino. I know I'm watching a Quentin Tarantino movie, but it's not intrusive the way Wes Anderson's style just sort of screams, "LOOK AT ME! I'M WES FUCKING ANDERSON!"

At some point in the movie, there's a clip from an old Steve Zissou documentary where he's in the Antarctic or someplace and everyone's kind of partying and he tells everyone to be quiet. He hears an animal crying somewhere out there in the ice.

And that's when it twigged for me. I was watching a Buckaroo Banzai remake by Wes Anderson. I mean, Earl Mac Rauch should've received a writing credit, or at least an "inspired by."

When the end credits rolled, it was just overt. It didn't feel like homage so much as appropriation. "Great artists steal," and all that.

I don't know. I liked parts of the movie, especially the sets. But once I was aware of the Banzai ripoff, I was even less into the movie as I kept looking for more ways Anderson ripped off Banzai, and did it in a way that seemed disrespectful to the original.

It's a shame too, because I love all the actors, and the sets were cool. The scene near the end in the mini-sub was pretty interesting in the post-TITAN era. "Are we safe in this?"

"Probably not."

I did a quick search this morning, and the similarity hasn't gone unnoticed. But the web sites that seem to have any writing about it are just ad-infested assaults on the eyes, so I didn't pursue it any further.

Anyway, disappointed. Wes Anderson movies often make me laugh, which is, I suppose, their point. But this one just made me a little mad, and I felt bad when I laughed.

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