Clever!

Rating: 10/10 (15 April 2006)

I guess that what truly differentiates the children's movies that my generation has grown up watching from those of previous generations is the various references to other things (think the popular culture references in "Shrek" I and II, and the genie's Rodney Dangerfield and Jack Nicholson imitations in "Aladdin"). "Finding Nemo" brilliantly continues this. It focuses on Marlin (Albert Brooks), a tense clown-fish searching for his son Nemo, who got caught by an Australian dentist. Along the way, Marlin meets Dory (Ellen DeGeneres), a big blue fish with short-term memory. Maybe it sounds too wimpy to say that the movie is about the importance of having solid relationships in one's life, but you might say that.
And the popular culture references? I never would have imagined a kids' movie spoofing scenes from Alfred Hitchcock's and Stanley Kubrick's movies, but they do it here. I don't know how they did it, but they did it. A very well done movie. Also starring Willem Dafoe, Brad Garrett, Allison Janney, Austin Pendleton, Geoffrey Rush and Eric Bana (those last two of course later co-starred in "Munich").