The Phoenician Scheme: Not Just a Pretty Face

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The Phoenician Scheme: Not Just a Pretty Face

Joe Peat, GFT Youth Board

Please note: these programme notes contain descriptions of plot and characters and are best read after watching the films.

In 1996, a seed was planted, and since then a flourishing and vibrant tree has blossomed. This tree is the career of Wes Anderson. He continues to thrive in the director’s chair with a style that blooms more fully with each release. His latest film, The Phoenician Scheme, is one of his most stylistically intense yet, but also one of his most substantial. While some critics argue that Anderson's distinctive style comes at the expense of emotional depth, it can also be seen as integral to his storytelling — not just a pretty face, but one that serves a deeper narrative purpose. Like François Truffaut, one of his greatest influences, Anderson often draws from real life. Whether it is the brotherly dynamics of The Darjeeling Limited or the shoeboxes of The Phoenician Scheme, Anderson’s films remain rooted in reality. But how does his highly distinctive style — so unique it’s almost a genre of its own — add weight to these real-life stories?

The Phoenician Scheme follows Zsa-Zsa Korda, a powerful but troubled arms dealer, as he narrowly survives an assassination attempt and grapples with his fractured family and dangerous business empire. At the heart of this journey is his strained relationship with his daughter, Liesl, a novice Catholic Sister torn between her faith and the family legacy she’s been thrust into. Together with Bjørn, Korda’s loyal assistant, they navigate high-stake betrayals and long-buried family secrets. Crucially, Zsa-Zsa uses shoeboxes to organise the many facets of the titular Phoenician Scheme — and just like him, Anderson organises the entire film around these boxes, dedicating each chapter to a different one. Far from being simple narrative devices, the shoeboxes are a direct reflection of Korda’s obsessive, compartmentalised approach to both life and work.

As set decorator Anna Pinnock puts it, arranging the set is “like composing a jigsaw puzzle with a paintbrush.” This level of stylisation is not a creative constraint, but rather the provider of deeper expression. Anderson’s symmetrical framing and dolly shots aren’t just there to captivate the viewer’s attention; they allow us to understand characters in ways that conventional filmmaking might not. Anderson has employed his signature visual flair for this very reason for decades — and The Phoenician Scheme is no exception.

So, where do the autobiographical elements in Anderson’s work come into play? Despite his imaginative brilliance as a storyteller, Anderson frequently draws on his own experiences to shape the most meaningful aspects of his films. For example, the shoeboxes in The Phoenician Scheme were inspired by Anderson’s late father-in-law, Fouad Malouf, a Lebanese industrialist who clearly served as the foundation for Zsa-Zsa’s personality and lifestyle. Anderson himself described Malouf as “an amazing kind of larger-than-life figure... wise and very intelligent, but a little bit scary” — a description that could just as easily apply to Zsa-Zsa. By drawing from real life, the vibrant, whimsical worlds Anderson carefully crafts are instantly grounded by real emotions. This is not the first time Anderson has injected elements of his own life into one of his films. In The Darjeeling Limited, starring Adrien Brody, Owen Wilson, and Jason Schwartzman, three estranged brothers agree to meet in India a year after their father’s funeral. The dynamic the brothers share is largely inspired by Anderson’s own relationship with his brothers. In the film, Anderson reveals elements of the brothers’ complex relationship by portraying their worldview to the audience. Throughout the film, the landscape is consistently shown as lacking real depth, suggesting that the brothers are closed off from embracing Indian culture. These intricacies highlight the nuances of these characters and their relationships. Just as the brothers are closed off from India, with Anderson’s superficial portrayal, they are also closed off from one another, a trait Anderson shared with his own brothers Eric and Mel, with whom he described as disconnect in their adulthood, explaining: “they fought a lot.” The combination of Anderson’s style and his drawing of inspiration from his own life allows audiences to more thoroughly comprehend the complexities of a fraternal relationship. In a world so fanciful, Anderson infuses authenticity.

18 years later, The Phoenician Scheme continues Anderson’s semi-autobiographical tradition. Like Zsa-Zsa, Fouad Malouf (the film’s dedicatee) used shoeboxes to organise his files as his health declined. In the film, Anderson presents these boxes with symmetrical framing and a pastel palette, visually conveying Zsa-Zsa’s meticulous and controlling nature, traits that mirror Anderson himself as a director. The concept of the protagonist and the director working in dialogue is furthered by the film’s structure, with each chapter based on a different shoebox, turning Zsa-Zsa’s categorisation into the organising principle of the story. Zsa-Zsa may be a tribute to Malouf, however, he is also a vessel for Anderson to explore and critique himself. Their dynamic is self-reflective, encouraging the audience to confront their own emotional terrain underneath the stylised surface. By drawing from real life, Anderson makes Zsa-Zsa the emotional engine of a larger-than-life story — one that encapsulates why Anderson’s style is so important.

It is a style that is more than just a facade, one used to evoke feelings that would not be felt if shown conventionally. Authenticity shines in a world of whimsy. Anderson universalises his own experience as he encourages the viewer to look beyond his fanciful framing to find something within.

The Phoenician Scheme is screening on Tuesday 29 July as part of the BFI Film Academy Recommends programme, free for 15-25 Card members.

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