The Royal Tenenbaums - Television Tropes & Idioms

The Royal Tenenbaums is a 2001 dark comedy directed by Wes Anderson and written by Anderson and Owen Wilson.

Probably the first Wes Anderson film to really hit the mainstream, it was nominated for the Oscar for best original screenplay.

The Royal Tenenbaums is about the Tenenbaum family:

Royal Tenenbaum (Gene Hackman): former lawyer. The patriarch, distant and boozing, treats his kids very inequally. Is separated from...
Etheline Tenenbaum (Anjelica Huston): archeologist. Spent most of her early life schooling her three genius children...
- Chas Tenenbaum (Ben Stiller): Financial wizard. Went into business for himself at an early age selling Dalmatian mice. Had his father disbarred for stealing bonds out of his safety deposit box.
- Margot Tenenbaum (Gwyneth Paltrow): Playwright. Known for her secrecy (isn't that an oxymoron?). Hasn't written a play in years. Spends most of her time smoking in the bathroom.
- Richie Tenenbaum (Luke Wilson): Famous tennis player, known as The Baumer. Secretly in love with his adopted sister Margot. Very hairy and very sad.

Other important characters include:

Eli Cash (Owen Wilson): Richie's childhood friend. Now a famous author.
Raleigh St. Clair (Bill Murray): Margot's neurologist husband.
Henry Sherman (Danny Glover): The new object of Etheline's affection, also an accountant.
Pagoda (Kumar Pallana): The Tenenbaums' servant. He both saved and endangered Royal Tenenbaum's life.

The movie depicts Royal's attempts at getting closer to his family after failing to pay rent at the Lindbergh Palace Hotel. He fakes stomach cancer to gain their sympathy and access to the family home. Like most Wes Anderson films, it is marked with quirky sets and costumes, as well as much deadpan humor.

A kind of sister movie to Wes Anderson's later project The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou, which has nearly identical cast and a similar (though much more dream-like) atmosphere.

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Big Applesauce: Despite taking place in New York City, Anderson went to great lengths to avoid any major landmarks. There's a scene earlier in the film - when Pagoda and Royal meet in Battery Park - in which Pagoda blocks the Statue of Liberty.
Big Screwed-Up Family
Bittersweet Ending: Royal manages patch things up with his family, even when it comes to light he doesn't actually have cancer. (He only say as such to get his family to talk to him). However he later dies of a heart attack.
Black Comedy
Braids, Beads and Buckskins: Eli Cash.
Brother-Sister Incest: averted ADOPTED sister.
Bungled Suicide: Richie
Emotionless Girl: Margot.
Expy / Shout Out: Word Of God has it that Eli is a combined expy of authors Cormac McCarthy and Jay McInerney. Similarly, Margot's first husband - a Jamaican reggae musician named Desmond - is supposed to be reggae legend Desmond Dekker.
Film of the Book: The film's conceit is that it's based on a (nonexistent) best-selling book.
First Father Wins: Royal patches up his relationship with the kids, but doesn't remarry his ex though.
Foot Focus: A barefoot Margot uses her toes to turn a doorknob.
Four-Fingered Hands: Margot, after an accident.
- With the consequential alteration of her gloves.
Gene Hunting: Margot attempts this at 14. It doesn't end well (see above).
Guess Who I'm Marrying?: Only it's the ex-husband who has a problem with this more than the kids.
- Chas is less than stoked, at first.
Important Haircut: Subverted when Richie cuts his hair/shaves just before a suicide attempt
Incest Is Relative
Insistent Terminology: Royal always introduced Margot as his adopted daughter.
I Take Offense To That Last One: After a private detective reveals Margot's secrets, including numerous illicit affairs, Raleigh's first response is, "She smokes?"
- Although it makes sense in the emotional sense of the scene, not only did Margot cheat on him, he never even found out that his wife of several years is a smoker, basically showing that he didn't know her at all.
  - Discovering his ignorance of this fact might particularly sting, considering that to observe behavior is mostly what Raleigh does for a living.
  - The fact that no one knows that she smokes is also something of a Running Gag.
Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Royal treads the line between this and full blown Jerkass.
Les Yay: Margot is shown making out with a woman at the age of 21 in a montage of makeout scenes depicting her past.
Limited Wardrobe: One of the few live action examples. Every Tenenbaums child has a uniform that doesn't really change throughout the film/their entire lives.
- Chas then retires his (and his sons') when Royal dies.
- Chas's retirement of his wardrobe is a sign of character growth: Word Of God says that he dressed himself and his sons in bright red track suits at all times so that if there was an emergency in a crowded place, they could spot one another easily. By retiring this, it shows he's going to stop being so overprotective of his kids.
Love Dodecahedron: Margot is desired by no fewer than three men in the movie itself, and we see flashbacks to several other failed relationships.
Narrator: The narration is by Alec Baldwin.
Not Blood Siblings: Richie and Margot.
The Oner
Overprotective Dad: Chas, since his wife died.
Parental Favoritism: Richie is easily the favorite of the family. Royal told everyone he met Margot was adopted, and would introduce her as, "My adopted daughter." Chaz had money stolen from him by Royal several times, usually by way of Royal have contorl over his businesses while he was still a minor, and seems to harbor the most resentment to his father in adulthood. Richie got along well with Royal, who took him to (admittedly seedy) places around the city. When Royal comes back, Richie is the only one who hits it off with him right away, although Royal is a bit disappointed Richie lost his famous match (due to having placed a large bet that he'd win).
Present Day Past: Although the characters age approximately twenty years between the prologue and the "present day" of the movie, it's still kinda the seventies...with some current music and technology, and dates on two gravestones clearly stating 2000 and 2001.
- This is defining trait of Wes Anderson.
Pretty in Mink: Margot. She always seemed to have a mink coat she would wear whenever she felt like it, even as a girl.
Real-Life Relative: Richie and Eli who desperately wanted to be a Tenanbaum are, of course, real-life brothers.
Redemption Equals Death: Though it takes a while for Royal to find out.
- You could argue Royal invoked this Trope to get his family to forgive him, by way of faking a terminal illness.
Scenery Porn: Every set is adorable and quirky. YMMV.
- How about the closet crammed several feet high—on all sides—with '70s board games: where Chas threatens Royal? Yet Another Example of the Wes Anderson retro-collage school of art direction, yeah...still, it's kinda cool.
Shout Out: A brother and sister living in a museum (hiding inside, at night) is more-or-less the plot of E.L. Konigsburg's From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. Minus the Squick, as it was a children's novel. Another literary reference: a character in J.D. Salinger's Franny and Zooey is endlessly in the bathtub, smoking. Wrong gender, though, to be like Margot. However, given the prominence in Salinger's fiction of child prodigies—and Manhattan as a setting—it seems unlikely to be coincidental.
Spiritual Sequel: The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou.
Take That: Peter Bradley, the talk show host who interviews Eli badly, is based on Charlie Rose. (The Criterion edition DVD of Rushmore has among its bonus features Charley Rose interviews with Wes Anderson & Bill Murray. During the course of both interviews, Rose repeatedly states the main character's motivation as wanting his face on Mount Rushmore.)
Teen Genius: All three Tenenbaum children are subversions/deconstructions.
The Unfavorite: Margot, who is never allowed to forget that she's adopted, and that she's not a "real" member of the family.
Walking the Earth: Or sailing the Earth, which Richie did after he learned Margot was married.
You're Not My Father: Royal pulls a variant on Margot, and gets it thrown back in his face.
Royal: (talking about Henry) He's not your father.
Margot: Neither are you.
Wounded Gazelle Gambit: Royal fakes stomach cancer in order to reconnect with his family. Henry finds out it's a lie with little difficulty.

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