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Gustave is played by Ralph Fiennes, who appears to be having tremendous fun, which is spooky in and of itself. (A bit like when Christopher Eccleston was Doctor Who and sometimes had to do ‘light-hearted’, which always gave me the willies.) Gustave is meticulous, fastidious, loyal, fruity, semi-comic, believes in providing service, loves poetry and a certain perfume — ‘L’Air de Panache — and to bed old ladies, out of choice, because fillet steak is all very well, but ‘the cheaper cuts are more flavourful’. (As a cheaper cut myself, I would say this is true, although you must expect more gristle.) He beds the insanely rich Madame D. (an unrecognisable Tilda Swinton bathed in Gustav Klimt robes), who then dies, leaving a will that leads to a tussle involving her evil son (Adrien Brody), her lawyer (Jeff Goldblum), a police officer (Edward Norton) and, eventually, a prison-break, which throws up Harvey Keitel. There are chases on skis and chases in funiculars and chases in cars and chases across rooftops as various cameos pop up (Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, Willem Dafoe) and young Moustafa courts the girl who works in the local patisserie, Agatha (Saoirse Ronan), and now that is enough famous names to be going on with, I think. Don’t be greedy.
So there is lots to see, as it zips along, like an old-fashioned screwball caper, but where is its heart at? Anderson has said he was inspired by the work of the Viennese writer Stefan Zweig, a Jew who fled Austria in 1934, following Hitler’s rise to power in Germany, so is its larger theme the impending threat of fascism? The soldiers who stop Gustave and Moustafa on train rides, causing bloody noses, and colour to leak on to the screen before finally turning black and white? Is it a paean to an era that would soon be obliterated by an occupying army; an army who ultimately set up base at the hotel? Is it right to think of the Grand Budapest Hotel as GBH in some way?
Questions, questions, questions, and I can’t actually answer any of them — sorry! My brain is only small! — but can say that, while we feast visually, we aren’t given much reason to feel anything. No sorrow, no tension, no joy. Everything is at a chilly, highly stylised remove, and we are not encouraged to especially care about any of the characters. Do they even matter? You wouldn’t think so, given the way Gustave and Agatha, particularly, are dealt with so bleakly and abruptly at the end.
So, a film to enjoy with your eyes, but which may make no connection elsewhere, and is just like a dream: vivid at the time and in the immediate aftermath, but then gone…
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