Wes Anderson Royal Tenenbaums" was nominated for an Academy Award and ranked by an "Empire" poll as the 159th greatest film ever made. Anderson's next feature was "The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou" (2004) about a Jacques Cousteau-esque documentary filmmaker played by Bill Murray. It serves as a classic example of Anderson's style, but its critical reception was less favorable than his previous films, and its box office did not match the heights of "The Royal Tenenbaums". In September 2006, Steely Dan's Walter Becker and Donald Fagen released a tongue-in-cheek "letter of intervention" for Anderson's artistic "malaise" following the disappointing commercial and
The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou reach port. Zissou convinces Eleanor to rejoin the "Belafonte", and then leads the crew on a rescue mission. They track Bill to an abandoned hotel on a remote island, saving him along with Hennessey, whom the pirates have also kidnapped. Ned and Zissou then make one last search for the shark in the ship's helicopter, but the aircraft malfunctions and they crash. Ned dies from his injuries and is buried at sea. Prior to Ned's death, Eleanor revealed to Jane that Zissou is sterile, therefore Ned could not have been his son. Zissou finally tracks down the shark in a