The film has been described as "a love letter to journalists set at an outpost of an American newspaper in a fictional 20th-century French city", centering on three storylines. It brings to life a collection of tales published in the eponymous The French Dispatch, based in the fictional French city of Ennui-sur-Blasé. The film is inspired by Anderson's love of The New Yorker, and some characters and events in the film are based on real-life equivalents from the magazine.
