The Best of Wes Anderson: Rushmore

1. Rushmore
2. The Royal Tenenbaums
3. Bottle Rocket
4. The Fantastic Mr Fox
5. The Life Aquatic

The distressing thing about the above list is that it's nearly chronological. It isn't very surprising when you consider the fact that every one of Anderson's movies have been about precocious burn-outs: Max Fischer in Rushmore, Richie in Tenebaums, Steve Zizou in The Life Aquatic — all of them peaking too soon, choking, flunking out, in premature decline. Zizou is Max all grown up (or refusing to). I'm not sure what this tells us other than the fact that Anderson's movies seem to know more than he does. Tenenbaums gets better with each year, like a family album.