Big Fish

Big Fish is nowhere near a perfect movie. Sometimes the dialogue is awkward, the pacing drags at times, and Steve Buscemi is, as always, a weirdo. There are bizarre and fantastical ideas that can take you out of the movie. For all its flaws, I can't give it more than an 8. That being said, this is my favorite movie of all time.

Big Fish strikes a chord with me. It examines the value of a life, our modern-day myths, and, ultimately, the nature of our humanity. I don't cry easily, and I'm not just saying that - I didn't cry at Schindler's List, or Titanic; but Big Fish makes me sob every time. The ultimate catharsis, where a man's identity, value, integrity, and family are all validated, and his life has been a life worth living.

Tim Burton was definitely the man for the job on this film, and if you like his other classics like Pee-wee's Big Adventure, Beetlejuice, and Batman, you'll probably enjoy this one, too. What else can I say, this is my favorite movie.

I approach Tim Burton films with a certain trepidation. Will it be "Edward Scissorhands" or "Batman II?" With Burton you could get a quirky comedy, a dark thriller, or sweet morality tale. And there's always the possibility of Danny DeVito chomping down on a raw fish.

"Big Fish" combines Burton's unusual humor with a heart-wrenching story of a father-son deathbed reconciliation. Albert Finney and Ewan McGregor share the role of Ed Bloom, one of the big fish from the movie's title while an SUV-sized catfish plays the other. Bloom is a metaphorical and literal big fish in the small pond of Ashton, Alabama in this tale told mostly through flashback. Jessica Lange plays his wife and Billy Crudup plays the son, Will, estranged from his father for the past three years. Father and son are reunited as Finney lies dying of cancer.

Ed Bloom has spent his life spinning his personal history into mythological proportions: an early encounter with a very tall man becomes a battle with a house-sized giant; a rural village is depicted as heaven on earth; military service during the Korean War morphs into a behind-the-lines mission that would make Duke Nukem proud. Originally a true believer, Will now knows everything his father has told him was not just an exageration or even a tall tale but an outright lie. In his effort to understand the truth behind his father's stories he learns to love the man as well as the mythology. And Burton delivers a terrific punchline at the end of the film that left me both tickled and weeping, a truly weird emotional state.

Burton deals with mythic themes in "Big Fish." Besides the surface story of the generational tension between father and son he explores the metaphor of the big-fish-in-a-small-pond by examining the impact Ed Bloom has had on the lives he's touched in his workaday contacts with colleagues, customers (he's a traveling salesman), and people in the small towns across the South. Not exactly "It's A Wonderful Life," he still manages to show how all of us -- even the little fish -- have profound effects on the people around us. And of course love -- unrequited and reciprocated -- control almost all of Ed's many adventures.

The acting is wonderful. You will actually believe two Brits and a Scot (Finney, Helena Bonham Carter, and McGregor) are natives of small town Alabama. Lange brings dignity and brio to the role of the long "suffering" wife -- and she still looks great(!)-- you believe she has had a long and loving life with Finney/McGregor. DeVito is a delight in the role of a circus ringmaster. But the scene-stealer is Bonham Carter in the dual role of Jenny and the crone witch.

I rated this movie ten stars and when you see it you'll do the same.

Every other year you get a movie that oozes magic and charm. Think "Chocolat". Think "Amelie". Think "What dreams may come". Perhaps even, "Being John Malkovich". And this year, it's time to think big... "Big Fish", to be precise. All four of these movies have some things in common. Merely describing the premise is not nearly enough to do justice to the mood of the film. And the mood, the emotional reaction of the audience, is in many ways much more important than the actual content. Still, there's no way around it in a proper review: We meet a disillusioned young man and his father, a charming old guy who knows exactly how to tell stories to fascinate first-time listeners and children. Unfortunately, there's barely any of those left, as he retold his magical stories once too often. When his health and life are beginning to fade away, his son wants to finally learn the truth about his father. Meanwhile, we hear his life story, as he tells it... Tim Burton is probably best-known for visual eye candy movies. Few directors can compete with the imagination he's shown in movies like Batman, Nightmare before Christmas and Sleepy Hollow. Outside the realm of darker, more gothic visuals, Tim Burton has so far been somewhat less prolific. Planet of the Apes was an expensive embarrassment, and Ed Wood is a decidedly acquired taste. Big Fish, then, is a new direction for him. Yes, it is eye candy, or perhaps even eye H"agen Dazs. But this time, the movie has much more of a soul than his monkeyplanet. This soul is achieved by two means: a great story (or collection of stories) and great acting. If you don't believe that the story is great, watch the audience. At key moments, everyone was chuckling or laughing, at others, I heard dozens of sniffs and tissues being unpacked around me. Yes, this is heartwarming stuff that a colder, more cynical soul would call cheese. Finally, Burton has found a story worthy of his talents again. And, better yet, he did not forget to encourage his cast to act. For a case study of such failure, see Christina Ricci's completely flat performance in Sleepy Hollow. In Big Fish, the cast is so carefully selected that failure is simply not an option. Ewan McGregor (playing the father in his youth) may not have much more to do than smile, be charming and sustain a Southern US accent, but he does it brilliantly. Much more important are the performances of Albert Finney and Jessica Lange, playing the aged father and mother, respectively. And they both deliver character performances worthy of prizes.

After cheerleading so enthusiastically for this movie, perhaps it is time to take a step back and look at it from a more critical perspective. Yes, it managed to enchant the audience, but it did so the Hollywood way. Special effects and big budget feature heavily. This is in stark contrast to the seemingly much less organized and much more intuitional charm of Amelie. This movie is also much more comfy about its pace - it takes its time just like a good storyteller would, but perhaps leaving behind the five-second-attention-span MTV generation kids in the process. On the other hand, I am tempted to say that its biggest vice is that there just isn't enough of it. Given the episodal structure of this movie, I can almost imagine what it would have felt like as TV series, or multi-part TV movie. I am not sure whether to wish for this to happen or shudder at the thought of "Big Fish: The Animated Series" or some such atrocity. Every story told in this movie is perfect, and a series of such perfect stories would be wonderful. Yet can perfection be sustained for a large number of stories? Either way, I wonder what is going to become of Big Fish - a franchise or a single movie. It definitely is more deserving of praise, awards and viewers than any other movie released during the past six months, including LOTR-RotK.

What do you say about this movie?

I am at a total loss to describe it. The concept itself, a son tries to come to terms with his dying father that he knows nothing about but an enormous catalog of unbelievable stories, doesn't sound very promising. It sounds like a tired old formula, and I expected such when the rental started playing

It's not.

Werewolves, giants, witches, siamese twins, bank robbers, hidden cities, sirens, etc. are all present in the fantasy, but they seem unremarkably to be part of the life of an otherwise ordinary traveling salesman. Whether they really are or not is never made completely clear, but that's the rub.

I once read a review by Harlan Ellison in which the main point was how a well told lie illuminates the truth in far better clarity than a simple recitation of the facts ever can. At one point in the film, the questing son remarks to his bed-ridden father that he's heard all of his stories thousands of times, and he has know idea who his father really is. The father's reply is, `I've never been anybody but me from the day I was born. If you don't know who I am, that's your failing, not mine.' Later investigations make the point clearer. I'll bet Ellison loved this movie. It is an extraordinary lie.

Did I like the film? You bet. It's Tim Burton's best work without a doubt. Is it for everybody? Probably not. Many will find it confusing and pointless, but good fantasy is like that. All I can say is, relax and let it happen. You won't regret it.

My father was a brilliant sculptor and a great visionary. When I was a kid, I never could explain what he was doing. I got it a month before his death when i was 26. This film filled my eyes with tears, because it reminded me him. he had a lot of ideas and brilliant and original ideas for improving the world, but for all his life he could not sell it to anyone, because those ideas filled his whole day. Literally. His whole apartment was filled with papers. Thank you for this movie. Thank you for the message. I would add a note that when we dream, we are escaping from the world of facts and truths. When my father said that if you think of anything in life, you have to write it down because what comes to your mind it never comes again it changed my life. Now I'm writing a book - a novel from environment of Mesopotamia and that just because my father was someone who believed in imagination and creative values​​.