Big Fish
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Movie Reviews of Big Fish
Movie Review: It's all true . . . really, it is . . .
Summary: 5 Stars
This movie, by Tim Burton is by far one of his best. I have enjoyed most of Tim Burton's movies in the past such as, The Nightmare Before Christmas, and Edward Scissorhands; so when I saw the commercials for Big Fish I was instantly drawn in. Not to mention, Ewan McGregor is in it, so I was in love instantly! When I saw this movie, I was not disappointed and that is obvious because I saw Big Fish in theatres three times while it was there and the day it came out on DVD, I bought it. The movie is the story of a young man named Will (Billy Crudup) whose father Edward Bloom (Albert Finney) is dying. They had not spoke for a few years after Will's father took the spotlight at his wedding telling one of his outrageous tales. Now, while is father is lying in bed at home, Will who has grown up being told the many miraculous stories and tales of his fathers life, wants to find out the truth about all of the stories. Will does not believe that any of the stories that his father told him throughout his whole life are true and he feels he does not know who is father really is. As the stories and the movie unfold, Will learns more about his father and himself, as well as the reasons for the stories that his father told.
The movie goes back and forth between the present, and the stories being told as back-flashes. Young Edward Bloom (Ewan McGregor) is the center of all the tall tales that include a witch with a glass eye that shows how people die, a perfect little town called Spectre with no road to it and even a giant named Karl. Each story is told with Tim Burton's usual sense of imagination, sensational imagery and darkness. The stories all revolve around events that happened in Edward Bloom's life, but each tale in the movie reflect a real tall tale.
The actor's in this movie are all wonderful at the parts they portray. Ewan McGregor is excellent as the young, charismatic Edward Bloom. Albert Finney makes the old Edward Bloom glow, even though he is sick in bed most of the time. The contrast between the two actors as young and old is perfect. Jessica Lange as Will's mother and Alison Lohman as a young Sandra Bloom are also wonderful in this movie. The casting in this movie was amazing and adds a lot to the rest of the movie as a whole.
Although Big Fish is a wonderful spectacle to see, I don't recommend watching it while you are tired because then it will seem a little slow. Believe it or not, I watched it once when I was tired and actually fell asleep. Every once in awhile there are parts that seem to kind of drag. That is made up for, however, in the great storyline and the colorful imagination and display of each story. I recommend this movie to be seen by everyone at least once and bring a box of Kleenex for the first time. Big Fish is a movie that can be enjoyed by people of all ages and genders. Since there is very little profanity and slight, but tasteful, nudity, this is a good family film and one that I even thought was appropriate to watch at a church youth group event. If you love Tim Burton's older movies, you will definitely love this one. Even if you didn't love his other movies, I still recommend everyone to rent this movie and see this outstanding spectacle at least once.
Movie Review: Grand Tale of a Storyteller
Summary: 5 Stars
Tim Burton's "Big Fish" spins a yarn about one of the great yarn-spinners of all time, Ed Bloom, and it does so in the enchanting fashion that makes great story-tellers proud.
The present-day Bloom (played by the great Albert Finney) is in the twilight of his life, beset by cancer and soon destined to leave this mortal coil. According to his son, Will (Billy Crudup), Bloom has filled his life with telling fantastic lies embellished with ridiculous fables enhanced by Bloom's own mythical view of himself. And Will has had enough of it, rejecting his father to work in Paris as a "just the facts" reporter - the duality is obvious: Dad tells false but interesting tales, while Son writes factual-yet-drab articles. As Will says, "Dad, you're like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny combined... you're just as charming, and just as fake." Against his wishes, Will returns home to be with his dad, along with his pregnant wife, during his last days.
As various characters interact with the dying Bloom, he continues to relate various tales about his past, which allows Burton to go into full flashback mode. According to himself, the younger Bloom, played by Ewan McGregor (one of the most likable actors working today), did lead one heck of a fantastic life, replete with witches, giants, werewolves, circus performers, Siamese twins, international intrigue, romances and, of course, a really big fish. Burton invests each of the various episodes in Bloom's past with a wonderful combination of realism and fantasy. One thing to remember about people who live in a fantasy world - to them, it's normal, and they tend to act like normal people. It is refreshing that for all the fantastic things Bloom saw and experienced, none of the characters appear to be too over-the-top or cartoonish.
This being a Burton film, also beware his trademark black humor. If you've seen other Burton films, it should come as no surprise that one character gets his comeuppance by having a heart attack on the john while "reading" a Playboy. (And what a wonderful comeuppance it is!)
Initially, Will refuses to engage his father's tales, and many stories are told to Will's wife, Josephine (Marion Cotillard). But then Will's mom (Jessica Lange) tells Will to start going through all of his father's accumulated personal effects from his long life, and Will starts to see some proof of his father's legendary exploits. And young Will gradually sees the wisdom in his father's penchant for exaggerating his own legends . . . and one of the movie's best moments comes when Will realizes that he's got a bit of Dad's storytelling ability running through his veins.
Beautifully shot, well-written, and well-acted (although one wishes that Jessica Lange had more to do with her role), "Big Fish" is sure to enchant viewers who appreciate a good story, and a heart-felt ending will have more than a few viewers dabbing the corners of their eyes.
The DVD has some decent extras, but nothing out of the ordinary (we're not talking about a Peter Jackson 4-DVD pack here). The pictures and sound are great - a good DVD for a delightful film.
Movie Review: An excurssion to the best within us
Summary: 5 Stars
Some encounters bathe your senses with ravishingly new waters that somehow leave you behind relishing a surprisingly familiar taste. Big Fish, for me, was one such encounter.
Based on Daniel Wallace's book, "Big Fish - A Story of Mythic Proportions", this is the story of Will's quest to demystify the tales and the life and the very person of his enigmatic father, Edward Bloom. A wonderful fairy-story in its own right, this is essentially an allegory depicting the complex, sometimes funny and often mysterious relationship between a father and his son.
More than the allegorical function, however, what really arrested my attention was the character and portrayal of Edward Bloom. A look at Bloom and you instinctively know that there goes a happy fella, as if playing in his own `garden'. And it gives you a glimpse of how beautiful this world is, and how wonderful it is to be alive.
However, it is not the virtue of his `world' per se that gives this flavor to his persona. For his world is in essence little different from ours: a similar blend of things good and evil, of friendship, malice, love, hate, jealousy, escapism, courage, cowardice, honesty, thefts, wars, health and disease...
Rather, it is Bloom's sense of life that projects the enchantment onto his actions, his people and his country. A sense of life that wants to grow; that refuses to get stuck in comfort and convention; that exercises courage over caution; that pursues beauty...and the best within itself...
A quote that eloquently reveals this sense of life of Bloom: "There comes a point where a reasonable man will swallow his pride and admit he has made a terrible mistake. The truth is, I was never a reasonable man."
Ultimately, all of us aspire to lead good lives, although `good' spells different things for different people. I have aspired to attain a free spirit, have believed in never giving up, have hoped to find magic in little things of daily existence, have nurtured ambition and disregarded convention and have happily been a `fool' (more about Bloom's idea of a `fool' later). I have tried and I yet keep trying. Many times have I failed, not only in my concrete pursuits but also im my attempts to reach this ideal. Many times has the loss brought me to the brink of desperation. But I have found my footing, eventually.
Even before watching this film, I vaguely knew of this ideal, but had no visceral image in my mind of how it might turn out to be. Big Fish provided me with that image. In a sense, it was a very satisfying vindication of my unconscious dreams and beliefs. Yet, amazingly, it was a profoundly and refreshingly new experience.
And that it continues to be every time I watch it.
I'll sign off with another quote of Bloom's that is essentially similar to the previous one, yet has an enchanting quality about it:
"There's a time where a man needs to fight, and a time when he needs to accept that his destiny is lost, that the ship has sailed, and that only a fool would continue.
The truth is, I've always been a fool."
Movie Review: So Big It's Hard to Wrap Your Arms Around...
Summary: 5 Stars
Well, I guess I would say that this film is one small step for Burton but one large step for post-modernism in film. (By post-modernism I refer to the reaction against the rationality, supremacy of facts, and simplified thinking of scientific modernist thinking.) It is true that the storyline was a bit choppy and that some characters were so flat I thought the breeze would knock them over. HOWEVER, I was so enraptured by the film that I think that such criticisms (which are usually important to me) fall by the wayside. What Burton has done with this film is visionary and new. And, while it does have problems, I think that's maybe due to the fact that he's simply one of the first in a new frontier.
What's so new about this film? Burton - using his already acknowledged unique genius - is the first director I've seen fully embrace and exploit many of the levels available in film for storytelling. I've seen several other films that have taken shaky first steps into the post-modernist world - "Chocolat" challenged the norm as far as morals; "Magnolia" loaded itself with complexity, pain, and hard realities; Kaufman's "Adaptation" & "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" pull out all the stops in screwing with the logic & chronology of the movie plot.
However, these forerunners in the post-modernist era fall short of what Burton accomplished. He takes you through Ed Bloom's unbelievable stories in a fantastical world that looks very similar to our own. But, rather than just let the entire story reside in this surreal realm, he challenges you to reconcile this realm with "the real world." Did any of this happen? Was the old Ed Bloom ever like his very endearing younger self? Were these stories a cover-up for affairs that he had while gone? Was this man simply an egomaniac?
Your one ambassador in this mind-bending investigation is Ed Bloom's son, Will Bloom, because Will is the rational mind trying to separate fact from fiction. He says everything you would say if you were given the assignment to figure out who Ed Bloom was & what was true about him. (And because of the need for this son's character & the emotional complexity he brings to the storyline, I am willing to forgive some choppiness and unnaturally speedy character development.)
As you and the son investigate the facts behind the story, you find that you tire of the son & his investigations. Rather, you long for more of his father's adventures, which are full of unexpected people, Burton-esque places and understated intelligence. If Burton uses this boredom with reality like I think he is, then this is one example of his many-leveled approach to develop his attack on rationality.
Personally, I became a committed fan of the film when Will is interviewing Jessica Hill. Both her character & her story are well-done, but what she represents is a key to the puzzle; the unveiling of her character unveils the internal logic of Ed Bloom's world. And I think what Burton introduces the audience to is somewhat akin to what Catholics call the mystique and mystery of God. I was very taken by this post-modernist exploration.
Movie Review: Burton is back
Summary: 5 Stars
I was worried when this movie was out. Though for many years he was known as the director with the midas touch, his two most recent films(Planet of the Apes, Sleepy Hollow), were neither the commercial success that was predicted, nor pleasing to his fans. This was all changed with Big Fish, a harkening back to the style that made him famous.
The movie is based off the relationship between a father(Ed Bloom: Ewan MaCgregor and Albert Finney) and his son Will(Billy Crudup). The relationship is a strange one, Will has little knowlege of who his father is, his father is given to telling tall tales. He has done this all his life, and seems to revel in being the center of attention. But his son tires of it and after an arguement they break contact. Until his mother calls telling him that his father is dying, and she thinks he should come home.
Ed Bloom then starts to tell his various life stories to his sons wife. They are all tall tales, and distinctly American in flavor. They range from a witch in the swamp that had a glass eye that you can see the time and manner of your death, to strange town in the boonies called Specter(you never leave because it is so perfect. These stories are done in the tall tale fashion, Ed Bloom always seems to have the answer and always comes off as charasmatic and virtuous. Ewan MacGregor always seems to have a grin on his face. But they all have the traditional Burton style of warped humor.
This is a much mellower and more family based than some of his movies, ie the dark fairy tale "Edward Scissorhands" or insane BettleGuise. Some of the stories still have that edge, ie the poor man living in the shadow of Bloom all his life and eventually has his woman stolen from him by Bloom, or the chinese singers who are also siamese twins. But the stories are usually upbeat and have a positive nature to them. His character is also made up to be the archtypical American Hero for that era. He is a sports star, good looking, charasmatic, brave, earned his own way, and served in the war receiving honors returning to his wife after it was all over.
The acting was good all around, and well cast. Ewan McGregor played his role excellently with the wide smile and thick sounthern accent. Helen Carter has two small but memorable roles and the girl who had a crush on Bloom and the witch. Danny Devito looks like he is having too much fun as the circus manager Amos Callaway.
The movie was surreal as any of Tim Burtons movies are, but he didn't let it cut into the movies emotional content. Which was the connection that the father had with his son and wife. Many consider this movie a tear jerker towards the end. Making this a great movie for a broad audience, families, couples, or fanatics of Burton's cinematic vision.