It had all the right ingredients...

Rating: 4/10 (28 August 2005)

Start with DreamWorks. You all know them as the new kings of movie animation, the crew who brought you Shrek and Shrek 2. Add in a heaping helping of all-star vocal talent from Will Smith to Jack Black, from Renee Zellweger to Angelina Jolie. Sprinkle in what should be an obvious "rags to riches" tale about a poor fish named Oscar who makes good, only to find out the good life isn't what it's cracked up to be. With all those ingredients the end result should be a tasty morsel of a movie, but the only thing these sharks take a bite out of is your wallet. What's really surprising about this film is that with the previous deft hand the DW crew showed at appealing to both kids and adults by mixing slapstick and action with romance and subtle (and occasionally naughty) jokes, this time they manage to not hit any of the marks. Sure this film is "cute" but unless you are taking very young children to the theatre, cute alone isn't enough to shell out $10 for let alone cut it as a rental or a take-home purchase. Cute is quickly replaced by vapid. The over-the-top stereotypes quickly become offensive, from rastafarian jellyfish who talk jive to Italian mobster sharks complete with a "don" voiced by Robert DeNiro (and he should be ashamed of this role). The storyline hints at a desire to delve deeper into issues of class and disenfranchisement, but Will Smith's hammy dialogue keeps you from taking him OR this movie seriously. And seriously, who decided fish should emote? They are not exactly the best choice for conveying a range of complex emotions, but those poor schelps who spent tens of thousands of man hours at computers animating this dreck tried anyway. In fact they even tacked on a pointless short for the home release where all the fish and sharks "get jiggy" in the film's car/whale wash, turning into a nightclub for the evening. What this movie proved to me is that even when you follow a perfect recipe, you can make a mediocre product. Repeat viewings are not necessary, and you may even feel once is too much by the end. Save for the sparks of life Jack Black gave this movie as a misunderstood shark who wants to eat plants instead of animals there's almost nothing memorable about "Shark Tale"; that is to say there's nothing memorable in a GOOD way. Recommended for the youngest and most naive of viewers only.