Moonlight kingdom's two protagonists grow feelings under the director wes anderson's guidance

Moonrise Kingdom

Wes Anderson’s film Moonrise Kingdom tells a story between two young people who meet unexpectedly and fall in love. The two are both troubled adolescents who seek an escape by running away to be with each other in a place they named “ Moonrise Kingdom”. Sam Shakusky, a foster child who always gets into trouble, is the mastermind behind the escape plan. He is an experienced club scout who writes letters to Suzy Bishop, his newfound lover. Suzy has a temper that always leads her to violent actions. Their empathy for each other builds their bond and fuels a strong connection.

Wes Anderson has a unique color pallet in his films that makes this one is no different. One of the most prominent characteristics of this film is Anderson’s use of yellow in almost every scene. Yellow costumes, furniture, filters, wallpapers, and paints are prevalent in every setting. Most of the colors that are used for costuming and production design are soft and can be described as a shade of pastel. The use of light colors creates a sense of innocence throughout the film. The only exception to this aspect of the film is during tense and sad situations. For example, Suzy’s parents have an unhappy marriage and when they are shown alone at night in their separate twin beds, blue is the dominant color. Mr. Bishop’s suspicion of Mrs. Bishop’s affair with the police captain, Captain Sharp, causes great tension between the two. Mrs. Bishop wears a light blue nightdress to symbolize the unhappiness within her while Mr. Bishop is shown from a high camera angle to express how belittled he feels. Suzy herself wears a red dress for the majority of the first part of the film to portray her aggressive nature, but at the end of the movie, she wears a similar dress but it is a bright yellow to show that she has found her happiness.

At the dawn of their relationship, Sam and Suzy frequently wrote letters to each other and flashbacks of events of their past juxtaposed one another’s. One of Sam’s flashbacks showed him in a house with many other foster boys, and he was the only one who wore a different outfit from the others who all wore white shirts and jeans. This is similar to Suzy, who attended a school that required the students to wear a uniform, but she wore a different dress than her peers. This emphasized the eccentricity of the two and the similar personalities they share. Later, when a family accepts Sam as a foster child, he attends a club scout camp and wears his uniform for the majority of the movie. However, the family decides that Sam is too much trouble and decides to let him go. At the end of the film, Captain Sharp adopts him and Sam ends up wearing a police uniform. Much like Suzy found contentment, Sam found solidarity.

The production design in the movie is unique and extremely precise which is another trait of Anderson’s films. The Bishops’ moderately depleted interior of their home showcases piles of books, toys, and vintage objects which depicts the home of a family that includes four young children. The books represent Suzy’s intrigue in literature, the toys portray the playfulness of her three little brothers, and the vintage objects illustrate the time period of the story which takes place in the mid-1960s. Anderson mainly creates symmetrical shots and therefore one half of the set often parallels the other. This symmetry is reflected with the production design through the set up of furniture and landscapes.

The editing and camera movements in Moonrise Kingdom greatly influence the flow of the film. Every time a scene cuts to another, both shots parallel each other in that the focus is on the same area of the screen which makes the film easy to follow. Anderson utilizes open framing and smoothly pans the camera every which way. There are also a lot of tracking shots that create interesting movement while the camera exits and enters rooms in the home of the Bishops’. Zooms are also apparent throughout the film, especially on Suzy as she looks out at the world through her binoculars. There are close ups of letters, such as when Sam and Suzy write to each other. This is another characteristic of Anderson’s films that can be noted in a few of his other films. There is a moment in the film which is slowed down, which was when Sam and Suzy were pronounced “ married” by a scout master. This scene is in slow motion to capture the moment as a time of happiness for the two once-troubled kids.