{"id":251,"date":"2015-03-18T20:50:26","date_gmt":"2015-03-18T20:50:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sharpegg.com\/sharpegg\/?p=251"},"modified":"2018-04-11T18:58:02","modified_gmt":"2018-04-11T18:58:02","slug":"three-things-about-the-grand-budapest-hotel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sharpegg.com\/sharpegg\/2015\/03\/18\/three-things-about-the-grand-budapest-hotel\/","title":{"rendered":"Three things about The Grand Budapest Hotel"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’m a huge fan of Wes Anderson. I love how his movies are set in almost dreamlands, so complete and absolutely immersive. Though all Wes Anderson films can spout a million and one tangents on any number of topics, I think these three are central to the\u00a0 The Grand Budapest Hotel<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

1. Landscape<\/h2>\n

Last week’s Fresh Air<\/a><\/em> had a great interview with Wes Anderson. One of the major things I took away was how inspired Wes Anderson is with the painter Caspar David Friedrich<\/a>,\u00a0a 19th-century German Romantic landscape painter.<\/p>\n

The film was mostly shot in Germany, the movie taking place in the fictional Republic of Zubrowka in central Europe. That fits well in the world of Friedrich’s work. Old school film techniques such as shooting with minatures and painted backdrops makes Anderson’s films seem from another generation.<\/p>\n

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Stills from the movie<\/p>\n

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Caspar David Friedrich’s The Watzmann<\/em>, Hills and Ploughed Fields near Dresden <\/em>and Midday<\/em><\/p>\n

For more on Caspar David Friedrich, visit Artsy’s website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

2. Music<\/h2>\n

Alexandre Desplat’s soundtrack helps to add to the Anderson atmosphere. A quick search on Desplat<\/a> shows the vast array of films he is composing for, from Argo<\/em> to Harry Potter<\/em> as well as Fantastic Mr. Fox<\/em> and\u00a0Moonrise Kingdom<\/em>. The music sets the mood perfectly through the movie. I think this might be the first soundtrack to his movies that does not contain any sort of pop song in it, instead using some Eastern European sounding music to round out the score.<\/p>\n