Wes Anderson's Phoenician Scheme
Wes Anderson’s Phoenician Delight
I had seen the previews and did not think I would like it. But when The Living Church published its review, I knew I should see it.
The film is The Phoenician Scheme. Mid-twentieth century, there is a powerful, rich man with a scheme to make a fortune (another fortune?) from a project that involves slave labor and engineered shortages. In addition, this man has survived many assassination attempts—and has had black-and-white visions of an afterlife. He has nine sons and one daughter. He has decided to make her his sole heir. She must help him with his scheme. She is a novice Catholic nun. The film’s set-up is over-the-top unrealistic yet contains stylized scenes and background classical music. It is, of course, a comedy, if a dark one.
[There are spoilers ahead. Consider yourself warned.]
One might say it is a comedy in the classical sense. TLC says, with a nod to Thomas á Kempis, that it embodies the conflict in the human heart between the Way of Nature and the Way of Grace. The father embodies the Way of Nature, including being a “relentless destroyer of all that stands in [his] way.” The daughter, in white habit, embodies the Way of Grace. Her father had sent her away when she was 5. He has just summoned her to him for this scheme which he then unfolds before her. She is there—present—and yet surprising: she gets his sons to start saying prayers; she offers forgiveness, quickly, with a small sign of the cross, whenever he makes the slightest sign of regret.
It all comes to naught, his plan. He ends up underwriting the whole project—which (without slave labor etc.) does benefit the people of Phoenicia, but at the same time it bankrupts him. Why does he do that? At the end, he and his daughter are relaxing at cards following a day of cooking and serving food and washing dishes—they are doing small-scale good in life and they are enjoying simple pleasures. She is also now engaged. She admits to a certain agnosticism about prayer. Has he repented? Is this what reformation looks like?
I am told that Wes Anderson is not known for taking religion seriously. But I was delighted to see this film, in which religion and power meet and, like a true comedy, the end is satisfying.
In this sense, as I’ve said before, the book of Job is also a comedy—though it gets to its simple, home-centered conclusion in a rather different way!
—
Out & About: The Good Books & Good Talk seminars resume in Dallas on Sun., Sept. 14, with Nicolas Diat’s lovely account of his visits to various French monasteries, A Time to Die. I highly recommend this book to everyone, and if you can join the conversation all the better—5 p.m. at St. Matthew’s Cathedral.
—
On the Web. Christianity Today has also taken note of Wes Anderson’s current film. Their review is titled: “Wes Anderson Finds God, Played by Bill Murray.” Their summary line? “The Phoenician Scheme is absurd and imperfect. It also takes faith seriously.” https://www.christianitytoday.com/2025/06/phoenician-scheme-wes-anderson-culture-movies-hollywood/
TLC’s final verdict is worth quoting as well: “In The Phoenician Scheme, Anderson makes a strong case that the Church is the only effective form of protest against sin, evil, and death that we have.” Its review is here: https://livingchurch.org/books-and-culture/film-reviews/the-dogmatic-theology-of-wes-anderson/