The next decade has a bright start. Fox Searchlight has confirmed they will be releasing Wes Anderson’s star-studded new film The French Dispatch in 2020, as well as the first official word of a cast list and synopsis, which provide a few hints at what to expect. First up, here’s the synopsis:
The French Dispatch is a love letter to journalists set in an outpost of an American newspaper in a fictional 20th-century French city and brings to life a collection of stories published in The French Dispatch magazine.
Anderson said earlier this year that his 10th film is about “an American journalist based in France who creates his own magazine. It is more a portrait of this man, of this journalist who fights to write what he wants to write. It’s not a movie about the freedom of the press, but when you talk about reporters, you also talk about what’s going on in the real world.”
Now, getting to the cast, the first press release lists them in the following order, which hints at who may be getting the most screentime: Benicio Del Toro, Frances McDormand, Jeffrey Wright, Adrien Brody, Timothée Chalamet, Léa Seydoux, Tilda Swinton, Mathieu Amalric, Lyna Khoudri, Stephen Park, Owen Wilson, and Bill Murray.
Curiously, Fox Searchlight didn’t include some other names that were previously reported to be in the cast, including Elisabeth Moss, Lois Smith, Willem Dafoe, Bob Balaban, Henry Winkler, Kate Winslet, Jason Schwartzman, Christoph Waltz, Griffin Dunne, Denis Ménochet, Vincent Macaigne, Cécile de France, and Rupert Friend. It remains to be seen if their parts are more cameo in nature or they didn’t make the final cut, but we’ll find out next year. Regardless, get ready for what is now officially one of next year’s most-anticipated films.