Walking With Goblins: A Wes Anderson Lens

Logan Brunk ‘27

After three days of trekking around Joe's Valley, Utah, three exhausted, dirt-caked Subarus made their way down Highway 70. The fleet carried unkempt gear, ten weary passengers, and a gas station cooler that had given up days ago. The ten friends, with hearts full of pride and sadness from climbs gone done and undone, and stomachs left empty from their limited stores of proatmeal and shelf-stable chicken, had one stop left on their block break list.  

In the parking lot, beanies were removed to reveal stiff, matted hair, while a faint crackle of sore joints and bone-dry skin could be heard echoing through the Utah air. Some of them begrudgingly applied sunscreen while others took a few deep breaths, only to inhale sand granules that danced an evasive jig between their back molars. After many minutes of hangry deliberation, the motley crew left their bags of sweaty clothes to ferment in the midday heat, strapped on their packs, and put on a masterclass in controlled breathing as they rotated through the pit-toilets. Then together, they set off on a walk with goblins.  

The photos below are from the day my friends and I explored Goblin Valley State Park, Utah. As we made our way back towards the Colorado/Utah border, all of us craved a relaxing walk to begin recovery from the beatdown we had subjected our muscles, skin, and ego to. As my friends scrambled between the unique rock forms, or “goblins,” I pulled out my camera, eager to capture the memory. The setting reminded me of one of my favorite cinematographers, Wes Anderson’s Asteroid City, so I decided to try my hand at editing the photos in a similar style. 

While the monologue above may be a humorous exaggeration of our journey to the park that day, my experience is that often you can tell when a trip needs to come to an end. Whether it be a lack of clean clothes or the stench of a cheap cooler that could knock you back ten years, there is an odd mixture of cues and emotions that signal that a trip has run its course.

 Images were taken on the indigenous lands of the Ute and Timpanogo Peoples.