Not Just a Kid's Movie

Rating: Null/10 (6 June 2003)

It seems as though rated "G" movies are often under-advertised and never really make money or are even worth watching. Generally they're made specifically for children and any humor in the movie is lost on those over the age of seven. Pixar, in the past, has defied these common sentiments with movies like Toy Story 1, Toy Story 2, A Bug's Life, and Monster's Inc. Pixar continues to defy standard Hollywood practices with the release of Finding Nemo.
This movie is, by at least a little bit, the best rated G movie I've ever seen. Monster's Inc comes in a little behind in second place. The animation in this movie is incredible, the water, the fish, the particles of dirt floating in the water...there were many points when I would watch the movie and could definitely not be sure whether I was looking at a real or animated sea-scape.
The story...the story wasn't anything particularly groundbreaking other than the setting...father loses his son, will do anything to find him. In this case, anything includes taking on sharks, jellyfish, pelicans and other random sea monsters. The father, Marlin, is a clownfish that defies his name by being particularly unfunny...luckily he picks up a sidekick early on with a short term memory problem - a little memento-esque.
Nemo, the son, is captured by divers and put in an aquarium in Australia, where he meets several psychotic fish including "Gills," another fish from the open sea - whose voice belongs to William Dafoe (in a non-bad guy role!).
Of course, being a comedy, the movie does have a happy ending, but the ending isn't nearly as much fun as the trip taken to get there. The movie is great, I went along with two college age friends, and they both laughed as much as I did. If a kid's movie can make three college students laugh as hard as we did...it is definitely worthwhile seeing. The movie is genuinely funny and worth watching with the entire family. The movie is safe for small children, though there are a couple of potentially scary scenes that might frighten *really* young children. However, I would definitely recommend going to a later showing...after most children would be in bed. I made the mistake of watching "Ice Age" at 5 PM - and the theater was unfortunately filled the the laughter/screams/crying of children, which took a little away from the movie for me.
One more thing - Pixar shares a short 3-5 minute computer animated short. In fact, it was the first short ever created by Pixar. The short was also very humorous and just made the whole movie experience more enjoyable. There was also a preview for Pixar's upcoming movie: "The Incredibles" which seems to be about a dysfunctional family of aging superheroes which I can only assume will be just as enjoyable and amusing as "Nemo."