The cinematic equivalent of fish food

Rating: 6/10 (5 July 2006)

Okay, so let's pretend for a minute that a wizard or something cast a spell on all of humanity and we were all turned into fish and had to live underwater, but had to cope with it in some way. This new world would look something like the one in Shark Tale. They're fish, but they seem a lot more like people anyway (and most of the characters resemble the actors who provide their voices). It's the same principle as The Flintstones, really, except with a nautical theme instead of a prehistoric one; instead of seeing Ed Sullistone on TV, we see Katie Current. You get it.
The movie itself is generally pretty silly. It's not like Finding Nemo, a good family movie that all ages could enjoy, it's aimed more at the kids. It has silly jokes and cheap laughs, but the satire in the plot would most likely go over kids' heads. And even some of the smaller gags will not make any sense, as I really doubt any kids watching this have ever seen A Few Good Men, Jerry Maguire, or, well, actually, some may have seen Gladiator. The boys, at least. But never mind that all. Because it has enough silliness to distract the kids and annoy the adults.
The cast is great, I'll admit that. It is definitely the highlight of the movie. Whoever thought of using director Martin Scorsese's voice? He is such a great director, but does have that unique voice, added to the fact that DeNiro, who starred in many of his most popular films, plays a role- I just think it was a great idea. But, that does bring me to a big nitpick of mine: If you had DeNiro and Scorsese together in an animated feature, such as this, wouldn't you want to have their characters interact more? They have only have two scenes together (3 if you count one with their characters talking on the phone- and since it's an animated film with only their voices anyway, why wouldn't you count it?) and they were just stupid. It was kind of like a pathetic, dumbed-down version of the "Who's on first" thing.
I don't really think Shark Tale was a bad movie, but with CGI films increasing and increasing in releases, this will be one that probably won't be remembered as well as some others. It was really just a silly cartoon, and you can't really read too much into it. And it's not a movie you need to devote much attention to. It's sort of the cinematic equivalent of fish food. It keeps the fish alive and everything, but I don't think the fish really rave about the flavour. It works, it's fine, but it doesn't stand out.
My rating: 6/10