"Finding Dory" fish-tails nicely with its predecessor, but has different strengths.

Rating: 8/10 (18 June 2016)

Movie Fans are always searching for something when we go to the movies. I mean, that's why we go to the theater, right? We're looking to be entertained, touched, inspired, educated, and more. Filmmakers are more than happy to facilitate our search. In the past three decades or so, we Movie Fans searched for Spock, spent time searching for Bobby Fisher and for Sugar Man, and engaged in efforts aimed at finding places called Graceland and Neverland, finding people called Forrester and Mr. Right and, of course, finding a little lost clownfish named Nemo. But all that looking was easier than actually finding a sequel to the Best Animated Feature Oscar winner "Finding Nemo". One of that film's voice acting co-stars, Ellen DeGeneres, spent years on her talk show calling for a sequel. You wouldn't think it would be difficult to find the motivation to make a sequel to one of the highest-grossing and best-loved animated films of all time, but the original's director and co-writer, Andrew Stanton, felt he needed to find a decent story first. Eventually, he did, and now Ellen and her co-stars, along with all of us Movie Fans, get to enjoy "Finding Dory" (PG, 1:37).
It's a direct sequel to the 2003 original, but is also part prequel and part sidequel. At the beginning of this film, we get a short origin story when we meet the adorable titular regal blue tang fish, who's even more adorable as a tiny, young swimmer (voiced by Sloane Murray and Lucia Geddes). Dory is struggling to navigate life under the sea as a small fish with comical (but not overdone) short-term memory loss but she has the help of her patient and loving parents, Jenny and Charlie (Diane Keaton and Eugene Levy). Sadly, Dory forgets about the dangers of the undercurrent near her home and she ends up getting swept away from mom and dad, and just lost. As an adult, Dory (Degeneres) meets a clownfish named Marlin (Albert Brooks) who is desperately working at finding his lost son, Nemo (now voiced by Hayden Rolence), and the kind-hearted Dory offers to help Marlin find Nemo. (That's the sidequel part.) A year after Nemo is found and returns to life off the coast of Australia, Dory is living right next to Marlin and Nemo's anemone home and regularly accompanies Nemo to his school of fish. During one of the lessons taught by Mr. Ray (a spotted eagle ray, voiced again by Bob Peterson), Dory flashes back to a memory about her parents. She decides that she needs to find them and asks Marlin and Nemo to help her – even though it means swimming to California. Marlin is reluctant to embark on another adventure in the open ocean, but he kinda owes Dory for helping to save Nemo and all, so Marlin agrees. With the help of their old friends the sea turtles, led by Crush (again voiced by director and co-writer Andrew Stanton), and with his son, Squirt (now voiced by Bennett Dammann), Dory, Marlin and Nemo make it all the way to an educational water park at Morro Bay, California... but have no aquatic idea what to do next.
As with "Finding Nemo", in "Finding Dory", creatures of various species show themselves to be more helpful and compassionate to each other than most members of the species homo sapiens are. After Dory gets herself scooped up by people harvesting fish off the coast, a couple of lazy sea lions (Idris Elba and Dominic West) lift their heads off of their favorite rock long enough to hook up Marlin and Nemo with a (literal) loon named Becky. She scoops Marlin and Nemo up in a pail and helps them get inside the Marine Life Park in hopes of finding Dory. Meanwhile, Dory has been tagged and taken to a quarantine area, where she waits with the other sea creatures to be shipped to a new large aquarium in Cleveland. Dory meets a grumpy octopus named Hank (Ed O'Neill) who is set to be sent back to the ocean, but wants Dory's fin tag so he can be sent to Cleveland. (And why not? With a world-class arts scene, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, improving sports teams and terrific zoo, what's not to love?) Marlin and Nemo spend the rest of the movie overcoming obstacles to find Dory as she, with Hank's help, tries to find her parents. Dory gets additional aid from Destiny (Katilin Olson), a nearsighted whale shark who turns out to be a long-lost childhood friend, and a beluga whale named Bailey (Ty Burrell) who lacks confidence in his own echolocation abilities. Guided by additional flashes of memory, the signs within Marine Life Park and the educational loud-speaker narration of Sigourney Weaver (as herself), Dory slowly zeroes in on finding out what happened to her parents, even as all of the characters learn some lessons about determination, helpfulness and valuing each other's individual qualities.
"Finding Dory" is a true sequel to its predecessor, but has different strengths. While "Finding Nemo" was a revelation in its animation and story-telling, "Finding Dory" keeps the action more confined and tighter. The first film has more interesting characters and more laughs, but the sequel has more heart. Of course, the sequel also benefits from the significant advances in computer animation over the previous dozen years. The backgrounds are wonderful, the textures on the sea creatures are remarkable and the colors are vibrant. I definitely recommend "Finding Dory" (whether you saw the original or not) – and I'd also recommend that you get to the theater early enough for the adorable animated short "Piper" (which is deserving of an Oscar nomination, along with the main attraction) and stay long enough to see the cute and funny post-credits scene. From the end of the previews until the screen finally goes dark, it's all worth it for "Finding Dory". "A-"