Summary
Ethel is walking down the street when Royal pops out from around a corner and asks if she has a minute to talk. He tells her that he wants to spend time with her and his children. “I want my family back,” he says, but Ethel doesn’t want to hear it. When she stomps away, he tells her that he’s sick and dying, and he wants to spend time with them in his last six weeks of life. “What are you talking about?” Ethel asks, shocked. She apologizes and begins to sob hysterically. When he sees that Ethel is very upset, he takes back what he said, admitting that he’s not actually sick, but that he’d still like to spend some time with his family. Ethel strikes him, in awe of the fact that he could be so manipulative. She storms off again, and Royal once again says that he is dying. “Are you or aren’t you?” she asks, and Royal says that he is.
The scene switches and we see Ethel on the phone with Henry, who asks her if she’s told her children, which she has. We see Chas telling his children about Royal’s condition over the phone. “You told us he was already dead,” one of them says, to which Chas responds, “Well, now he’s really dying.” Then we see Eli speaking to Margot over the phone about it. Then we see Richie dictating a response to the news on his boat in the middle of the ocean; he tells his mother he is returning home.
Richie arrives in New York and waits to be picked up. As a bus pulls up, Margot gets off and locks eyes with Richie as Nico’s “These Days” play. Margot walks towards Richie slowly and they embrace. The scene shifts and we see everyone at the Tenenbaum residence. On the roof the next morning, Richie sets his hawk Mordecai free from its cage. He sits down and reads a book of Margot’s plays.
Chapter 3. Royal arrives at the Tenenbaum residence, and Pagoda lets him in. In the living room, he tells his family how much he’s missed them, and Margot asks him about the fact that he’s dying, and he tells them he has cancer and not much time to live. Chas seems especially disinterested, reading a book in the corner, as Royal tells them, “I’ve got 6 weeks to set things right with you, and I aim to do it. Will you give me a chance?” He wants to take the kids out to see his mother’s grave, and when Richie mentions that Rachel, Chas’s deceased wife, is also buried out there, for a moment Royal doesn’t remember who Rachel is. Furious, Chas, storms out, followed by Royal, who asks to meet his grandsons.
When Royal says goodnight, Richie gives him a hug. Royal then goes to Pagoda, telling him that he’ll contact him in the next 12 hours with further instructions. Just then, Ethel and Henry pull up in a cab, and Royal goes over to introduce himself. “Hey lay it on me, man,” he awkwardly says to Henry.
The scene shifts and we see Margot and Eli riding in a convertible. Eli asks how Richie is doing, and Margot says, “I don’t know. I can’t tell.” Eli tells Margot that Richie sent him a letter saying that he’s in love with her, and Margot is surprised. He tells Margot not to mention it to anyone, since it was told to him in confidence.
We see Ethel and Henry at an archaeological site examining some soil. Henry pulls Ethel aside, apologizing for interrupting her at work and saying, “I just want to apologize for the other day when I proposed to you.” Ethel cannot understand why Henry is apologizing, and as she tries to assuage his insecurities, Henry falls into a pit nearby, unnoticed. When Henry climbs out of the pit, Ethel tells him she’s very nervous, mostly because she hasn’t slept with a man in 18 years. Henry caresses her face and they kiss.
Royal visits Chas’ sons at a gymnasium, whistling to them from afar and motioning for them to come talk to him. When they go over, he asks them the name of their hound dog; it’s Buckley. He introduces himself as “Royal” and gives them his condolences for the loss of their mother, whom he calls “a very attractive woman.” After apologizing for not being around more often, Royal encourages Ari and Uzi to ask their father if they can meet him. “But we just met,” says Uzi, to which Royal responds, “ No we didn’t. Look, I’d like us to have a relationship, but we have to pull some strings to make it happen.”
The scene shifts and we see Uzi and Ari confronting their father, Ari saying, “I’ll bet mom would have wanted us to meet him before he died, wouldn’t she?”
A title card reads “Maddox Hill Cemetery.” Royal puts some flowers on his mother’s grave, as Richie, Chas, Uzi, and Ari stand by watching him. Chas starts to leave to go to his wife’s grave, and Royal hands him half of the bouquet of flowers that he just put on his mother’s grave. Alone with Richie, Royal asks, “So what do you think about this big old black buck moving in there?” Richie doesn’t quite understand, and Royal clarifies that he’s talking about Henry.
Elsewhere in the graveyard, Uzi and Ari are sitting with Margot, who tells them she’s adopted, that when she was 14 she went to find her real family in Indiana, and got her finger accidentally cut off by her father. The scene shifts back to Royal telling Richie he should have kept playing tennis a little bit longer. Royal then says, “I had a lot riding on that match you know, financially and personally. Why did you choke out there that day, Baumer?” We see footage of the tennis match in which Richie lost it all. In the footage, Richie cries and looks mournfully at Margot and Raleigh St. Clair, whom she had just married. Back in the present, Royal acknowledges that he disappeared after Richie lost the match. Richie is understanding and says, “I know you’re not that good with disappointment.”
Royal goes up to Chas and examines the BB bullet that he shot at Chas as a child, still lodged in Chas’ knuckle. “Why did you shoot me?” asks Chas, reminding Royal that they were on the same team. We then learn that, at one point, Chas sued his father. “You think you can start forgiving me?” Royal asks, but Chas isn’t ready to leave it in the past.
We see Margot and Richie walking together. Richie offers to talk to Margot about her marriage to Raleigh, which he hears is going through a rough patch. “I heard about that letter you sent to Eli,” Margot says, to Richie’s surprise.
Analysis
The humor of the film is often absurd. This is especially the case when Royal confronts Ethel about wanting to spend some time with his family, telling her that he is terminally ill and only has 6 weeks to live. Upon hearing the news, Ethel immediately walks back towards him. The camera remains stationary, as Ethel wanders back into the frame, flabbergasted by the horrifying news. Soon enough, she is sobbing uncontrollably, but no sooner has she internalized Royal’s bad tidings than he is admitting that it was all a lie to get her attention. The lie, as well as Royal’s quick turn, is shocking and darkly comic. One minute Ethel is sobbing, and the next she is hitting him angrily. She storms off yet again, when Royal says that he is indeed dying one more time. Once again, Ethel walks back into the frame. These sudden erratic switches highlight the dysfunctional nature of their relationship, but in a comedic way.
A complicating element of the plot is the intimacy shared between Margot and Richie. As adoptive siblings, they are not related by blood, but they are still siblings, which seems to account for the fact that their mutual affection has always been kept a secret. Indeed, Margot has gotten involved with a number of men in her life in various complicated ways. When we first meet her in adulthood, she is living with Raleigh St. Clair, but soon decides to leave him in order to return to her childhood home, where she begins an affair with Eli. In contrast to these two lovable buffoons, Richie Tenenbaum, her adoptive brother, seems to be her one true love, a kind of romantic ideal.
The moment of Richie arriving in New York and Margot picking him up is an especially cinematic one, and demonstrates Wes Anderson’s interest in romantic ecstasy and the music of the 1960s and 70s. We know that Richie has enlisted someone dear to him in New York to pick him up, but as the bus pulls up to the harbor, it is unclear who will emerge. When Margot does, there is a silent suspension for a moment before Nico’s cover of Jackson Browne’s “These Days” begins to play. The use of this song—melancholy and romantic all at once—at the scene of Margot and Richie’s reunion, has the effect of showing that the two of them only have eyes for each other, while also showing the sadness of their predicament.
Royal Tenenbaum remains a highly dubious and untrustworthy character. He resorts to manipulative means in order to get back into his family members’ lives and seems to make no effort to connect with them in any substantive way once he does. Of his three children, Chas is the least excited to see him, and clearly holds a huge grudge against his father. This doesn’t stop Royal from introducing himself to Chas’ sons, Uzi and Ari, when Chas isn’t around, and hatching a means of insinuating himself back into the affection of his son. Royal is opportunistic and manipulative at every turn, and yet the film does not seek to vilify him in an explicit way, instead rendering his selfishness and neglect with an absurd and lighthearted tone.
At the graveyard, Royal seeks to make amends, speaking to his sons individually. He talks to Richie about the fact that he was disappointed that he ended his tennis career prematurely, but Richie forgives him easily, empathizing with his father’s point of view. When he tries to make amends with Chas, it’s less smooth, as Chas still holds a deep grudge against his father and even sued him at one point. There are evidently many things about which Royal Tenenbaum must make amends, but forgiveness is not freely given.
