Shark Tale

***Shark Tale*** is a 2004 American computer-animated comedy film produced by DreamWorks Animation and directed by Vicky Jenson, Bibo Bergeron and Rob Letterman. The first computer-animated film by DreamWorks Animation to be produced at the Glendale studio, the film stars Will Smith, Robert De Niro, Renée Zellweger, Angelina Jolie, Jack Black, and Martin Scorsese. Other voices were provided by Ziggy Marley, Doug E. Doug, Michael Imperioli, Vincent Pastore and Peter Falk. It tells the story of a fish named Oscar (Smith) who falsely claims to have killed the son of a shark mob boss (De Niro) to advance his own community standing.

*Shark Tale* premiered at the Venice Film Festival on September 10, 2004, and was theatrically released by DreamWorks Pictures on October 1. The film opened at #1 with $47.6 million, which was the second-highest opening for a DreamWorks Animation film at the time, behind *Shrek 2* ($108 million). It remained as the #1 film in the U.S. and Canada for its second and third weekends, and made $367 million worldwide against its $75 million budget, despite generally mixed critical reception from criticism toward its overuse of pop culture referencial humor and some character designs, while the animation (particularly the visual aspects) and voice performances were mostly praised. It was also nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, losing to *The Incredibles*.

## Plot

In Southside Reef, a cheeky-chappy bluestreak cleaner wrasse named Oscar fantasizes about being rich and famous. Soon after arriving for work at the Whale Wash, he is called to the office of his boss, a pufferfish named Sykes, to discuss the fact that he owes a large sum of money and must pay it back by the next day. He remembers being humiliated as a child because his father was a tongue scrubber, so his angelfish best friend Angie offers him a shiny pink pearl that was a gift from her grandmother to pawn and pay his debt. Oscar brings the money to the race track to meet Sykes, but hears that the race is rigged and bets it all on a seahorse named "Lucky Day". Sykes is annoyed that Oscar bet the money but agrees to see how the race turns out. Moments before Lucky Day crosses the finish line, he trips and loses.

Meanwhile, a family of criminally-inclined great white sharks which has associates such as killer whales, swordfish, and octopi has a problem with one of their sons, Lenny, who is a vegetarian and refuses to act the part of a killer. His crime lord father, Don Edward Lino, orders his violent eldest son Frankie to mentor his brother in the family business. Frankie sees Oscar left for dead in the middle of the ocean by Sykes' two jellyfish enforcers, Ernie and Bernie and urges Lenny to eat Oscar, but Lenny instead frees Oscar and tells him to escape. Furious, Frankie charges at Oscar, but suddenly an anchor falls on his head, killing him. Devastated and frightened, Lenny flees in a fit of survivor guilt. As there were no other witnesses and Oscar was seen near the body, everyone comes to believe that he killed Frankie, an opportunity that Oscar decides to exploit for fame.

Oscar returns to the city with a new title of "Sharkslayer". Sykes becomes his manager and Oscar moves to the "top of the reef" to live in luxury. At the same time, Don Lino has everyone search for Lenny. When several sharks approach Oscar's neighborhood, his neighbors expect him to drive them away so he goes and encounters Lenny. Since he does not wish to return home, Lenny begs Oscar to let him stay at Oscar's house. Soon, Angie finds out about the lie and threatens to tell everyone. Oscar and Lenny stage an event in which Lenny pretends to terrorize the town and Oscar defeats him. Though this further cements Oscar's reputation and causes the beautiful but vindictive Lola to become his girlfriend, it infuriates Don Lino. Afterward, Oscar and a tearful Angie get into an argument, where she reveals that she had feelings for Oscar even before he became the "Sharkslayer", causing Oscar to dump Lola and reflect on the consequences of his selfishness.

Oscar buys some Valentine's Day gifts for Angie but learns that Don Lino has kidnapped Angie to stage a meeting. Lenny attends disguised as a dolphin named Sebastian. Don Lino threatens to eat Angie if Oscar does not comply. Lenny grabs Angie into his mouth, but later regurgitates her and reveals himself in front of his father. Incredulous, Don Lino disowns his son and chases Oscar through the reef. Oscar heads for the Whale Wash and ends up trapping Don Lino and Lenny in the machinery. Oscar is given an ovation by everyone, but he finally confesses the truth behind Frankie's death, he then tells Don Lino that everyone likes Lenny for who he is and urges him to respect everyone's individual choices. Inspired by Oscar's confession, Don Lino reconciles with his son and states that he and his gang bear the neighborhood no ill will. Oscar forsakes all the wealth he has acquired, makes peace with the sharks, becomes co-manager of the Whale Wash (now frequented by sharks, killer whales, and swordfish), and lives happily ever after with Angie.

## Cast

* Will Smith as Oscar, an underachieving bluestreak cleaner wrasse worker in the Whale Wash of Reef City who wants to be rich, but his schemes always fail and he ends up owing five thousand clams to his boss.
* Robert De Niro as Don Edward Lino, a great white shark and leader of a mob of criminally-inclined great white sharks, who wants his two sons to take over his business and run it together, but becomes infuriated when Oscar gets in the way following one of his sons' death. James Gandolfini was originally set to voice the character, but had to drop out.
* Renée Zellweger as Angie, Oscar's angelfish best friend and co-worker, who harbors a secret unrequited love for him.
* Jack Black as Lenny Lino, Don Lino's youngest son, who is a vegetarian.
* Angelina Jolie as Lola, a seductive female gold-digger lionfish whom Oscar develops a romantic interest in.
* Martin Scorsese as Sykes, the pufferfish owner of the Whale Wash and a loan shark to whom Oscar owes five thousand clams. He once worked with Don Lino, but was thrown out and called in his debts to pay off the gangster.
* Ziggy Marley and Doug E. Doug as Ernie and Bernie, two Jamaican jellyfish and Sykes' enforcers, who enjoy jabbing Oscar with their vicious stingers when he is in trouble with their boss.
* Michael Imperioli as Frankie Lino, Lenny's older brother and Don Lino's eldest and more savage son, who shares embarrassment of Lenny's vegetarian tendencies with his father.
* Vincent Pastore as Luca, Don Lino's green octopus "left-hand, right-hand man", with a tendency to state the obvious much to Lino's annoyance.
* Peter Falk as Don Ira Feinberg, an elderly leopard shark and leader of a mob of criminally-inclined leopard sharks, who is a friend of Don Lino performing karaoke (badly) at the sharks' headquarters.
* Katie Couric as Katie Current, the local reporter of Reef City in the U.S. release. At the time, Katie Couric hosted *Today* in America. In the Australian release, then local *Today* co-host Tracy Grimshaw dubbed the lines. Fiona Phillips of the UK's GMTV performed the voice for the British release of the film. Cristina Parodi of Italy's *Verissimo* provided the Italian version of the character.
* David P. Smith as Crazy Joe, a deranged hermit crab who is Oscar's other friend. He normally lives in a dumpster near the Whale Wash.
* Bobb'e J. Thompson as Shortie #1 (voice)
* Phil LaMarr as Prawn Shop Owner (voice)
* Jenifer Lewis as Motown Turtle (voice)

### ADR Loop Group

* Newell Alexander
* Rosemary Alexander
* Steve Alterman
* Tom Amundsen
* Steve Apostolina
* Kirk Baily
* Kate Carlin
* Mitch Carter
* June Christopher
* Robert Clotworthy
* David Cowgill
* Holly Dorff
* Iake Eissinmann
* Don Fullilove
* Elisa Gabrielli
* Jackie Gonneau
* Bridget Hoffman
* Rif Hutton
* Marabina Jaimes
* Art Kimbro
* Richard Miro
* Dyana Ortelli
* Devika Parikh
* J. Lamont Pope
* Phil Proctor
* Peter Renaday
* Steve Susskind
* Marcelo Tubert
* Claudette Wells

## Production

The film was originally developed under the title of *Sharkslayer*. By September 2003, however, it had been retitled *Shark Tale*, to make the title sound less violent and more family friendly. Bill Damaschke, the producer of the film, explained the change of the title: "We set out to make a movie a little more noir, perhaps a little darker than where we've landed." In April 2002, production officially began.

The film was produced concurrently with *Finding Nemo*, another animated film set underwater, which was released a year and a half before *Shark Tale*. DreamWorks Animation's CEO, Jeffrey Katzenberg, defended the film, saying that "any similarities are mere coincidence. We've been open with the Pixar people so we don't step on each other's toes."

## Release

*Shark Tale* was originally scheduled to be released on November 5, 2004, but was pushed back to October 1 in order to avoid competition with Disney/Pixar's *The Incredibles*. The film had its worldwide premiere on September 10, 2004 in Piazza San Marco in Venice, Italy. Screening as part of the Venice Film Festival, it marked the first time that Piazza San Marco was closed for a premiere of a major feature film. The film was projected on the largest inflatable screen in the world, measuring more than six stories tall and over 3,900 square feet (360 m2). It required 20,000 cubic feet (570 m3) of air to inflate and more than 50 tons of water for stabilization. The premiere was attended by 6,000 visitors, including Will Smith, Angelina Jolie, Robert De Niro, and Michael Imperioli. Jeffrey Katzenberg, the executive producer of the film, explained that they "wanted to find a unique way to introduce this movie to the world. We needed a big idea. … More than anything, we are in showbusiness. This is the show part."

### Box office

*Shark Tale* opened at #1 with $47.6 million, which was, at the time, the second-highest opening for a DreamWorks Animation film behind *Shrek 2* ($108 million). It remained as the #1 film in the U.S. and Canada for its second and third weekends.

Overall, the movie grossed $160,861,908 in North America and $206,413,111 internationally, bringing its worldwide total to $367,275,019.

### Critical reception

The film received a 35% "Rotten" rating at the review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes, with the consensus: "Derivative and full of pop culture in-jokes." On another review aggregator, Metacritic, the film holds a 48 out of 100 rating or "mixed or average reviews." Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A-" on an A+ to F scale.

### Home media

*Shark Tale* was released on DVD and VHS on February 8, 2005, accompanied with a DVD-exclusive animated short film *Club Oscar*. The three-and-a-half-minute short film continues where the main film ends, showing the characters of *Shark Tale* dancing at the whale wash to a spoof of *Saturday Night Fever*. It was also released on Game Boy Advance Video in October 2005. The movie was released on Blu-ray on June 4th, 2019.

## Possible sequel

In April 2011, Jeffrey Katzenberg commented that the studio did not have plans to produce future movie genre parodies, like *Shark Tale*, *Monsters vs. Aliens*, and *Megamind*, saying that these films "all shared an approach and tone and idea of parody, and did not travel well internationally. We don't have anything like that coming on our schedule now."

## Video game

*Main article: Shark Tale (video game)*
A video game based on the film was released on September 29, 2004 for Microsoft Windows, Xbox, GameCube, PlayStation 2, and Game Boy Advance. Published by Activision, Edge of Reality developed the console versions of the game, while Vicarious Visions developed the Game Boy Advance version, and Amaze Entertainment developed the PC version. The cast from the film did not reprise their roles in the game.

## *Club Oscar*

*Club Oscar* is a five-minute computer-animated film that was included as a bonus feature on the DVD and VHS releases of *Shark Tale* and is set after the film. In the short, the Whale Wash turns into a party club.

## Notes

1. ↑ In July 2014, the film's distribution rights were purchased by DreamWorks Animation and transferred to Universal Pictures.