A certain age: Wes Anderson, Anjelica Huston and modern femininity

Abstract

In the context of Wes Anderson's signature attention to age-related themes, this paper examines Anjelica Huston's characters and performances in three Anderson films, The Royal Tenenbaums, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou and The Darjeeling Limited. Although often overlooked by critics and scholars, Huston's characters are, by Hollywood standards, uncharacteristically independent, attractive and fascinating, with a significant range of personalities and professions. Arguably, they are among the strongest and most sharply defined female characters of middle age portrayed in recent and contemporary American cinema. The Huston characters also provide productive points of contrast to the films' male protagonists, especially the middle-aged ones.