Is any contemporary filmmaker’s work as instantly recognizable as that of director and screenwriter Wes Anderson? The bright colors, the careful shoebox-diorama framings, the love of antiquated vernacular, the presence of certain actors over and over again: Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, Jason Schwartzman, Ed Norton, Adrien Brody. Flip to a Wes Anderson movie, and you’ll know it’s one of his right away. His distinctiveness is why he receives more tributes and parodies — ‘Star Wars’ done like Wes Anderson! A horror movie done like Wes Anderson! — than any other filmmaker working today, even if Anderson himself doesn’t like those tributes. Simply, few other filmmakers have given us more pristine, museum-wall-worthy shots in the 21st century.

Anderson was born and raised in Houston and attended the University of Texas at Austin, where his roommate was future actor and collaborator Owen Wilson. Together, with Owen’s brother Luke, they made a short film called ‘Bottle Rocket’ that they then adapted into Anderson’s first feature film in 1996. His breakout was then 1998’s ‘Rushmore,’ which several critics called the best film of the year, and began the association that some have with him and the works of J.D. Salinger. Not an adaptation of any Salinger work, ‘Rushmore’ somehow captured the vibe of the reclusive author’s oeuvre and puckish characters like few others. It’s something Anderson even deepened with ‘The Royal Tenenbaums,’ the film that solidified his aesthetic.

A cinephile’s cinephile, he’s voted in the Sight & Sound film poll and talked at length about his favorite films (not to mention his favorite critics — he arranged a private screening of ‘Rushmore’ for a then-retired Pauline Kael in the late ‘90s). That’s why you see Fellini vibes in ‘The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou,’ an aesthetic worthy of Renoir and Ophuls in ‘The Grand Budapest Hotel’ (possibly his most celebrated film), a tribute to Showa-era Japanese cinema in ‘Isle of Dogs,’ as well as ‘50s sci-fi in ‘Asteroid City.’ He’s also become one of the premier adapters of Roald Dahl, with his animated film ‘Fantastic Mr. Fox’ and Netflix anthology ‘The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar,’ which won him his first Oscar, for Best Live Action Short. Throughout it all, Anderson is a lodestar for any filmmaker looking to be boldly individualistic.