#REVIEW: “THE PHOENICIAN SCHEME”

Review by Nicholas Porteous for Mr. Will Wong

Hundreds of immaculate, symmetrical compositions. Production Design as large and lavish as it is whimsical. An endless parade of A-listers cramming as many deadpan jokes as possible into their limited pockets of screen time. A distant father learning how to be *slightly* more emotionally available to his children. Have you guessed I’m reviewing the new Wes Anderson movie yet? The Phoenician Scheme, his latest dazzling dollhouse, fits snuggly with the rest of the beloved auteur’s oeuvre. And being his dozenth feature playing within a style and format that has become such a known quantity, that’s just as much an endorsement as it is a mark against it. If we lived in a world without Wes Anderson movies, I would champion Scheme as an indelible–albeit chilly–work of idiosyncratic beauty. But here we are, and I find myself particularly cold as the credits roll on what is simultaneously a work of painstaking passion and something of a rote exercise in a very specific type of movie that feels less and less surprising with every iteration.

Let’s drill down on specifics. The Phoenician Scheme follows Zsa-zsa Korda (Benicio del Toro) across the world, dodging assassination attempts and crafting various business deals as he guides his unlikely heir Sister Liesl (Mia Threapleton) towards her ascendancy. He shows her how to negotiate the best percentages–yes, their narrative progress is measured by a recurring chart of percentages–just as she brings a fresh perspective to his self-absorbed default settings.

Scheme wastes little time laying out its itinerary. We know the number and sequence of destinations early on, and the opening credits give away every major, potentially unexpected cameo in order of appearance. You’d think a movie so willing to explain itself up front would surprise you with some kind of emotional right hook, or deliver a raw experience that transcends its obvious narrative blueprint. While Scheme isn’t 100% straightforward in its story and character machinations, I can’t say it offers a single moment that feels truly spontaneous, or like it isn’t just another precise execution of Anderson‘s hyper-scrupulous, yeah, scheme.  del Toro and Threapleton represent distinct ideologies, but their performances are cut from the same dispassionate cloth. There’s no fun contrast to be had between these two straight-faced characterizations at the center of nearly every scene. Michael Cera, as Bjorn Lund–Zsa-zsa‘s assistant, injects the kind of whizz-bang dynamic energy that Scheme is crying out for, and is the unexpected MVP of the enormous Cast.

Am I giving Scheme a thumbs down? Not exactly. I’m still impressed by pretty much every tiny piece of this jigsaw. While it’s not a step forward for Wes Anderson by any stretch of the imagination, I would never call it lazy. And even though I wish he’d let his characters breathe a little and step outside of their predetermined compositions, nearly all of the cast of Scheme really tickled me. In the context of everything else he’s made, it’s pretty unremarkable, probably somewhere near the middle of the ranking. But even the most unremarkable Wes Anderson movie is still a Wes Anderson movie, and worth luxuriating in.

Focus Features and Universal Pictures Canada release THE PHOENICIAN SCHEME June 6, 2025.