Day 3: Let's Name The Zones Of The Open Sea...

FINDING NEMO (2003)
Directed by Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich
Starring the voices of: Albert Brooks, Ellen DeGeneres, Willem Dafoe, Geoffery Rush, Eric Bana

I don't know how Pixar does it.  I mean, who cares about fish, right?  They're...well, fish!  And yet, by the end of Finding Nemo, I found myself tearing up a bit, just as I did when I saw Wall*E and Up.  Tearing up over fish.  Pixar is the only movie studio that can do that for me.

I think one of the things that really helps is the fact that the story is so complex.  Marlin (Brooks) is an over-protective dad looking after his only son Nemo, but this goes from annoying to embarrassing as Marlin keeps a watchful eye over everything Nemo does.  Because one of Nemo's fins is smaller than the other, Marlin doesn't let his son do anything.  In an act of defiance, Nemo swims off, but is captured by divers and is put into a fish tank in a dentists office.  Blaming himself, Marlin sets off to find his son with the help of a forgetful fish named Dory (DeGeneres).  While Marlin and Dory scan the ocean, Nemo makes some new friends in the dentist's fish tank, including Gill (Dafoe) who is hell-bent on escaping, and plans to use Nemo to do it.  At the same time, Marlin is getting over his own fears of...well, everything, and tales of his exploits reach the ears of local pelican named Nigel (Rush), who just so happens to be friendly with the fish tank crew.  Eventually, it turns into an aquatic version of The Great Escape and both Marlin and Nemo turn out to be heroes neither one of them thought they could be.


It's really hard to do a simple synopsis of this movie; there's a lot going on in the 100-minute running time, but nothing ever feels rushed.  The story runs on the simple premise of giving your main character a goal and then putting as many obstacles as possible between them.  This technique is used a lot for one simple reason: it works.  And the reason it works is that it forces characters to emerge.  Characters are defined by choices, and the more choices you force on your character, the more well-defined they become.  And that's critical when your protagonists are fish.  There's a lot of disbelief to suspend, and well-defined characters help that happen. It also ups the ante when it comes to action and danger.  If we actually have some sort of emotional connection to the our characters, we feel their fear.  All of this goes toward working on an audiences emotions, and Pixar does it just as well, if not better, than many live-action studios.


A lot has been said about Pixar sort of "growing up" the animated feature.  What has been for years considered strictly a children's medium is quickly growing to cover much darker and more mature material, thus making it more palatable to adults who, most likely, were forced to bring their kids to the movies.  This really started in earnest the following year with The Incredibles, but there is still a lot for adults to enjoy here.  While not my favorite Pixar film (that honor goes to Wall*E), it's still got a lot to love.  It's funny, sad, exciting and heartwarming without being saccharine.  And it made me tear up over fish.  This is the only movie I can say that about.