An animation classic

Rating: 9/10 (7 June 2004)

Pixar has created something quite special with this film and I do believe that this deserves to be mention with the best of them although "Pinocchio" is still the king. Story takes place on a coral reef in the ocean off of Sidney, Australia where we find a clown fish named Marlin (Albert Brooks) who is always worrying about his son Nemo (Alexander Gould) because he was born with one extra small fin. One day Marlin's worries come true when Nemo is captured by scuba divers and taken away in a boat. Marlin tries to find his son by following the trail of bubbles but they quickly disappear and now he must find another way.
*****SPOILER ALERT*****
Marlin meets Dory (Ellen DeGeneres) who is a female and blue and also suffers from short term memory loss but she tags along with Marlin to help find his son. Meanwhile, Nemo has landed in a fish tank in a dentist office and he meets Gill (Willem Dafoe) who is a scarred gill fish and he has elaborate plans of escaping the tank and making it to a drain which leads to the ocean. Marlin and Dory while on their trek encounter sharks, poisonous jelly fish, sea turtles, and get swallowed by a whale but manage to escape through the blow hole. They get to the harbor by Sidney and with the help from a pelican they get to the office and see Nemo!
This film is co-directed by Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich and Stanton has become a very important director for Pixar. Three things stand out from this film for me and the first is the story that Stanton wrote himself. The journey that Marlin and Dory take to find Nemo is seemingly impossible but with the creative story it does manage to happen and it's a lot of fun to watch. Secondly, rarely has a voice in animated features stood out but what DeGeneres accomplishes here is nothing short of memorable. Her voice not only possesses humor but it also makes the audience feel sorrow and pity for Dory and she gives this animated character a new dimension. How can anyone not laugh when she talks whale and all it's dialects? Thirdly and not the least is the jaw dropping animation that is created for this film and the intricate details that take place are nothing short of brilliant. From the school of swerving jelly fish to the slow emergence of the whale from the darkness this film gives animation a depth and dimension that I'm not sure we have seen before, at least not like this! This is a rare visual delight that belongs to be mentioned with the other classic animated features.