Imagine the soul of seventies TV sea dog Jacques Cousteau inhabited by a jaded romantic... with an egomania issue.

Steve Zissou (Murray) is a celebrity marine biologist whose screen career is sinking like a stone until his trusty partner Esteban is savaged by a vicious jaguar shark.

Thrust back into the limelight after this morbid turn of events, Steve loyally swears revenge on the marine killer…and sets off with his trusty crew on the good ship Belafonte.

On board is adoring German engineer Klaus (Willem Dafoe in a neat comedy display) and cut-glass English journalist Jane (Blanchett - think Celia Johnson in a jumpsuit).

Also setting sail is Ned Plimpton (Wilson), a good ole' boy and Air Kentucky pilot who thinks he may - or may not - be Steve's long-lost son.

Jeff Goldblum plays Steve's nemo-sis Alistair Hennessey, a millionaire rival with the camp swagger of a Bond villain (except his bevy of beauties are pretty boys).

To add salt to an already salt-laden premise, Hennessey was once the husband of Steve's long-suffering wife Eleanor (Anjelica Huston).

The journey's other star is the Belafonte, a rusting former US Navy sub-hunter boasting a fully-stocked wine cellar and on-board Swedish masseuse.

The trip itself - as Zissou's permanently topless script editor comments - is: "a suicide mission led by a selfish maniac."

Director Wes Anderson attracted a galaxy of A-list celebs - Hackman, Paltrow, Stiller et al - to his previous ensemble outing, The Royal Tenenbaums.

Here there's less of that movie's contrived wackiness and more of a natural flow, with attention to detail lavished on a cartoonish gallery of characters.

Centre stage is Zissou, whose private life is becalmed while his public life ran ashore years before. Yet the appearance of Ned ignites a paternal flame he never knew he had.

Continual intrusions by the crew provide surreal flourishes - the deckhand who warbles Bowie's greatest hits in Portuguese - and warped setpieces - particularly a zero-budgeted assault on a pirate's island - lampoon the action genre.

The bizarre artificial fish are good too.

However, it's the touching interplay between a random grouping of flawed romantics that provides the film's emotional thrust, achieving the perfect balance of heart and sole.

Tim Evans