Strangely poignant, strangely haunting, strangely unbalanced

Rating: Null/10 (4 December 2003)

I saw Finding Nemo about four weeks ago (oddly, the British cinema release came seven months after the States, and almost coincided with the US DVD release) but haven't felt inclined to post until rumours began that it was going to be nominated for Best Picture. My initial impressions were: Yeah right. But the more I dwelt on it, the more I thought about my impressions of the film, I realised that it had just a legitimate a claim as something like Seabiscuit. My first impressions weren't fantastic, I must say. The first fifteen minutes or so were rather unsettling - the (SPOILERS) extermination of Marlin's family in the first scene of the film, the slightly tragic and psychological relationship between an overbearing Marlin and his son Nemo, and the slightly restrained depiction of underwater life - danger, we are reminded, is constantly all around - showed us instantly that this is no McDonalds-tied Disney secretion. This is something that director John Lasseter wanted to make into a proper film. This element of darkness and family tragedy is held erratically throughout the film, represented onscreen by Nemo's deformed fin. We have various encounters with nasty sea creatures including a bunch of effette yet unstable sharks, and a soulless killing machine of an Angler fish. The theatre that develops when Nemo is imprisoned in a tank full of fish who are slowly losing their minds is deliciously unpleasant as well. However, Pixar (or whatever forces influenced the script) copped out of making a truly daring work of art by shoehorning in the requisite number of 'Talk to the hand' and 'I love you guys' style jokes which, however much work has obviously gone into them, feel like a clash with Lasseter's vision. Dorey is an excellent sidekick, although I feel the adventures that her and Marlin get into are a series of interchangeable sketches rather that something with an overall meaning. Okay, enough with the dark side - let's praise something. The animation is flawless as always, it's always good to see people pushing the boundaries of what they thought they could do. The jokes are actually funny - Dorey especially is quite a novel comic device, and the voice performances were excellent all round. Somebody definitely had a love for the 'feel' of marine life, the slightly parched and washed out timbers and the ruggedness of the oceangoing fish. It was also pioneering to integrate the fishes' world with the human world; thus the film distances itself from something like The Lion King. Overall, the elements work enough to guarantee at least a four-star rating from any critic without some ongoing Disney vendetta. Pixar so desperately want to break with Disney so they can make the films that they, rather than Disneys' creditors, would like to see made. Yet they would have the same problem as they have here - too wide an audience: fidgeting toddlers to college jocks to knowing parents to film buffs. Pixar need to offend, and they passed up that opportunity in Finding Nemo.