Wes Anderson Movies, Ranked

Twelve features, all centered, all in some shade of mustard.

Entries
10
Category
Film
Updated
  1. A row of shoeboxes stacked in a 1950s private plane cabin, a grenade-shaped crystal decanter on a tray and a nun's rosary across a ledger.

    10. The Phoenician Scheme

    Wes Anderson · 2025

    Benicio del Toro as Zsa-zsa Korda, a 1950 arms dealer dodging assassins while trying to make his nun daughter his heir. Michael Cera steals it. Bill Murray plays God. Shot in an unusual 1.5:1 frame, it competed at Cannes and got a B-minus CinemaScore.

  2. A neat editor's desk covered in typewritten pages, a red pencil and a bicycle leaning in the doorway of a crooked French street.

    09. The French Dispatch

    Wes Anderson · 2021

    A love letter to The New Yorker, told as the final issue of a magazine based in a town called Ennui-sur-Blasé. Shot in Angoulême on more than 125 sets. The most Wes Anderson movie Wes Anderson has made, which is both the compliment and the complaint.

  3. A turquoise roadside diner in a pastel desert with a small observatory dome behind it and a meteorite under a glass case.

    08. Asteroid City

    Wes Anderson · 2023

    A 1955 stargazer convention, inside a play, inside a TV broadcast, on a desert town built from scratch in Chinchón, Spain. Jeff Goldblum plays the alien. Anderson's best wide-release opening, and the audience left still working out which layer they had watched.

  4. A rusty research ship's deck at sea with a red knit cap, an acoustic guitar and a diving helmet, a striped glowing fish in a tank.

    07. The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou

    Wes Anderson · 2004

    Bill Murray hunts the jaguar shark that ate his partner, among Henry Selick's stop-motion sea creatures, while Seu Jorge plays Bowie in Portuguese. It cost $50 million and made $34.8 million. The cult following showed up on time, just years late.

  5. A mountain of rusted cans and bottles on a garbage island under a grey sky, an empty dog collar with a tag hanging from a bent fence.

    06. Isle of Dogs

    Wes Anderson · 2018

    Stop-motion dogs exiled to Trash Island in a future Japan. It opened Berlin, won Anderson the Silver Bear for directing and got two Oscar nods. It also drew fair criticism for treating Japan as a backdrop: the dogs speak English, the Japanese mostly go untranslated.

  6. A red Adidas tracksuit draped on a chair in a dim Harlem townhouse room, white mice with black spots running across a board game.

    05. The Royal Tenenbaums

    Wes Anderson · 2001

    A family of burned-out child geniuses in a Harlem house, a father faking cancer to get back in, and Dalmatian mice spotted by hand with a Sharpie. Gene Hackman did not want to do it and won a Golden Globe anyway. Oscar nod for Anderson and Owen Wilson's script.

  7. A prep-school bulletin board crammed with club flyers, a navy school blazer hung below it and a small aquarium on a stand.

    04. Rushmore

    Wes Anderson · 1998

    Max Fischer runs every club at his prep school and is failing out of it. Bill Murray worked for scale, about $9,000 by Anderson's estimate, and got a second career out of the deal. Shot at St. John's School in Houston. National Film Registry, 2016.

  8. A yellow canvas pup tent on a small cove beach beside a portable record player, a pair of binoculars and a suitcase of library books.

    03. Moonrise Kingdom

    Wes Anderson · 2012

    Two 12-year-olds run away together on a New England island in 1965 while Bruce Willis, Edward Norton and Bill Murray fail to find them. It opened Cannes and got an Oscar screenplay nod. As usual, the adults are the ones who need supervision.

  9. A stop-motion style apple cider cellar with stacked jugs, a tiny corduroy suit on a hanger and a tunnel dug through the wall.

    02. Fantastic Mr. Fox

    Wes Anderson · 2009

    Stop-motion Roald Dahl, with voices recorded in a forest, an attic and a stable instead of a booth, while Anderson acted out scenes in Paris and sent them to animators by iPhone. Two Oscar nods, both lost to Up. Every swear is the word cuss. It works.

  10. A pink pastry box tied with blue ribbon on the front desk of an empty pink hotel lobby, a funicular climbing a snowy mountain outside.

    01. The Grand Budapest Hotel

    Wes Anderson · 2014

    Three aspect ratios for three timelines, a hotel lobby built inside an empty department store in Görlitz, and four Oscars, all for the crafts. Ralph Fiennes runs the place on manners and cologne. His biggest hit, at $174.6 million worldwide.

Honorable mentions

  • A string of firecrackers and a hand-drawn heist plan on a motel bed, a yellow jumpsuit folded beside them.

    Bottle Rocket

    Wes Anderson · 1996

    The debut, expanded from a short James L. Brooks saw at Sundance. It made $560,069 on a $5 million budget, launched both Wilson brothers, and Martin Scorsese named it among his favorite films of the 90s. The heist is a disaster. The movie is not.

Dishonorable mentions

  • A row of matching tan leather suitcases with painted animals stacked in a blue train compartment, a laminated itinerary on top.

    The Darjeeling Limited

    Wes Anderson · 2007

    Three rich, grieving brothers ride a luxury train across Rajasthan in search of a spiritual experience, and India mostly serves as scenery for their feelings. Ebert liked it. It comes with a separate prologue short, Hotel Chevalier, in case one trip was not enough.

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