Bottle Rocket (Wes Anderson, 1996)

Wes Anderson's first feature already set the pattern for the flights of gentle whimsy that were to follow, including, of course, the presence of Owen Wilson and his brother Luke too, who's hardly a stranger to Anderson's films. They don't actually play brothers, but their relationship as close and bickering loser buddies is akin to the same thing as they go through the time-honoured tradition of the comically failed heist. It skips along breezily and amiably, but there isn't more than a napkin's worth of script to it and hence struggles to hold your attention, something you certainly couldn't accuse Moonrise Kingdom or The Grand Budapest Hotel of, once Anderson had got to stretch his wings.

5/10