Big Fish: Introduction & Commentary
Big Fish is a 2003 film directed by Tim Burton and written by John
August, starring Ewan McGregor, Albert Finney, Billy Crudup and
Jessica Lange. It is loosely based on the novel Big Fish: A Novel of
Mythic Proportions by Daniel Wallace.
Big Fish received four Golden Globe nominations and one Oscar
nomination for Danny Elfman's original score. The film is much less
gothic than some of Burton's other works such as Edward
Scissorhands and Sleepy Hollow.
Here, Gothic is a kind of fiction begun in England with The Castle of
Otranto (1764) by Horace Walpole. It depended for its effect on the
pleasing terror it induced in the reader, a new extension of literary
pleasures that was essentially Romantic.
Prominent features of gothic fiction include terror (both psychological
and physical), mystery, the supernatural, ghosts, haunted houses and
Gothic architecture, castles, darkness, death, decay, doubles, madness,
secrets and hereditary curses.
The stock characters of gothic fiction include tyrants, villains, bandits,
maniacs, Byronic heroes, persecuted maidens, femmes fatales,
madwomen, magicians, vampires, werewolves, monsters, demons,
revenants, ghosts, perambulating skeletons, the Wandering Jew and
the Devil himself.
Important ideas concerning and regarding the Gothic include:
Anti-Catholicism, especially criticism of Roman Catholic excesses such
as the Inquisition (in southern European countries such as Italy and
Spain); romanticism of an ancient Medieval past; melodrama; and
parody (In contemporary usage, a parody is a work that imitates
another work in order to ridicule, ironically comment on, or poke some
affectionate fun at the work itself, the subject of the work, the author or
fictional voice of the parody, or another subject).
The word "melodrama" comes from "melos", the Greek word for song,
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combined with "drama". Music is used to increase the emotional
response or to suggest characters. There is a tidy structure or formula
to melodrama: a villain poses a threat, the hero escapes the threat (or
rescues the heroine) and there is a happy ending. In melodrama there is
constructed a world of heightened emotion, stock characters and a hero
who rights the disturbance to the balance of good and evil in a moral
universe. In recent decades the term has taken on pejorative
connotations.
Plot
The film follows the incredible life story of Edward Bloom
(McGregor/Finney) and his strained relationship with his son, Will
(Crudup). Will hasn't talked to his father for years, following an incident
that strengthened his belief that his father was a liar who didn't care
about his family. He approaches him again only after he learns that his
father is dying.
Through flashbacks, Will tries to recall and piece together the stories
his father used to tell him about his many adventures and how he lived
his life, which he believes to be just tall tales and impossible to believe.
Bloom's stories contain fantasy elements: a witch, a giant, a werewolf,
and so on, showing him as a lucky hero with few personal flaws.
Will sets out to grasp the idea behind these stories and to discover the
truth about the real Edward Bloom. When it all comes together, it turns
out that Edward's "unbelievable stories" are shown to have some
element of truth (e.g., Will meets a giant who is very tall, though smaller
than his father had made him out to be.) At the end, Will realizes he
made a mistake in not trusting his father, and that he needs to open his
mind more and be less cynical; finally, he manages to come to terms
with his father's need to live an extraordinary life. In the final moments
of his father's life, Will concocts a wild story that sends his father
Edward to the river, where he turns into a fish.
The ending of the movie is bittersweet in the sense that before Edward
Bloom passed away, his son managed to forgive his father for all his
deception. However, the ending proves that without a doubt his father's
stories were indeed based on true events, although exaggerated (e.g. the
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Siamese twins were actually twins but each had their own body; the
giant was a tall man; etc.)
One interesting thing about tall tales is that it is a story that claims to
explain the reason for some natural phenomenon, or sometimes
illustrates how skilled/intelligent/powerful the subject of the tale was.
In either case, the tall tale is fictional and usually obviously so. It can,
however, be based on a real figure in history.
The tall tale is a fundamental element of American folk literature. The
tall tale's origins are seen in the bragging contests that often occurred
when the rough men of the American frontier gathered. The tales of
legendary figures of the American Old West—such as Pecos Bill and the
giant lumberjack Paul Bunyan—owe much to the style of tall tales.
American folklore is essentially about immigrants and their
misunderstanding of each other, and of the new landscape they found
themselves conquering, and of the people that had already been there
when the first European colonists arrived.
Cast
Ewan McGregor - young Edward Bloom
Albert Finney - older Edward Bloom
Billy Crudup - Will Bloom
Jessica Lange - older Sandra Bloom
Helena Bonham Carter - younger & older Jenny / The Witch
Alison Lohman - young Sandra Bloom
Robert Guillaume - Dr. Bennett
Marion Cotillard - Joséphine
Matthew McGrory - Karl the Giant
David Denman - Don Price (Age 18-22)
Missi Pyle - Mildred
Loudon Wainwright III - Beamen
Ada Tai - Ping
Arlene Tai - Jing
Steve Buscemi - Norther Winslow
Danny DeVito - Amos Calloway
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Perry Waltson - Ed Bloom (Age 10)
Hailey Anne Nelson - Jenny (Age 8)
Destiny Cyrus - Ruthie (Age 8)
Commentary #1
Big Fish is an enchanting and whimsical treat for the whole family to
experience. Delightfully entertaining, beautifully filmed, and
heartwarming, this film is an amazing journey of Daniel Wallace's novel,
so spectacularly directed by Tim Burton. Big Fish touches on fantasy,
adventure, heroics, and the love and importance of a family.
Big Fish is a story telling at one of its finest. A movie so full of magic,
innocence, feeling, and vision. Big Fish is an exceptional movie that
shows cases so much of this man's creativity.
The story of Big Fish is quite simple. Will Bloom (Billy Crudup) returns
home to spend what little time he has left with his dying father Edward
(Albert Finney) after not speaking with him for three years and to give
support to his mother Sandra (Jessica Lange). Will needs to find out the
truth about who his father really is. As a boy he was told many stories of
how his father, when he was a young man (played by Ewan McGregor)
lived his life. Those stories, far fetched as they may have seemed, were
believed way past Will's adult years and now he wants to know why so
many lies about his father's life were told to him and others repeatedly
and so proudly.
Big Fish is a story upon a story upon a story. So many outrageous,
scary, and exciting stories unfold. Those stories are amusing, clever,
eerie, and warming to the soul. But, are those stories real or just fables
told so many times that they indeed become more of a work of
non-fiction than just a make believe story told to amuse the listener?
In a scene, one of my particular favorites is when Ed Bloom covers the
ground in Daffodils to show the deep love he has for Sandra ( this time
played terrifically by Alison Lohman). A gorgeous moment in Edward's
life that depicted an overwhelming amount of courage and sensitivity
without a flicker of doubt in what he set out to accomplish so
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eloquently. A stunning view of golden yellow sunshine sitting on green
grass looked so beautiful, but most importantly, the beauty was shown
from inside of his heart.
It touched people with its loving and all around good feeling message of
expressing one self through ways that teach, nurture, guide, encourage,
dream, and most of all show how strong love can be.
The question remaining, is Will going to get the answers he has been
searching for from his father, or have they been there all along, just not
believed to be anything but a work of fantasy? And will Edward be able
to pass down to his son, one of his traits that had made him the man he
said he was all along?
The soundtrack is an eclectic mix of oldies, but goodies and today's
music. Songs include Man of the Hour by Pearl Jam, Everyday by
Buddy Holly, All Shook Up by Elvis Presley, Five O’clock World by The
Vogues.
With such memorable stories, including the three roles played by
Helena Bonham Carter as a young and old " Jenny" and as "The Witch,"
Matthew McGrory as "Karl the Giant," Steve Buscemi as " Norther
Winslow," the outrageously funny Danny DeVito as " Amos Calloway," a
kindhearted performance by Robert Guillaume as " Dr. Bennett," and
Ada and Arlene Tai as " Ping and Jing."
Commentary #2
To tell you the truth, Big Fish is probably not as memorable a movie as
The Princess Bride or Brazil, simply because it doesn't have a clear
focus on a target audience. It may be too sentimental for the young guy
audience, too grown up for the kids' market, and too silly for the
hard-core SciFi/Fantasy fans. In essence, it's a story of a father and son
reconciliation told in a fanciful way. Fanciful, to say the least.
Albert Finney and Billy Crudup play a father and son with issues.
Finney is a compulsive story-teller, a guy who has always answered any
serious question about himself with a long and exaggerated fish-story.
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Crudup was an adoring son until he was about ten, at which point he
realized that every word his father had ever told him was a lie. That
didn't stop the old man, however, who continued telling his tales and
even embellishing them further. Now the father is dying and the son
wants to come to terms with who his father really is underneath the
stories. Before the movie ends, the two of them must reconcile the real
world and the fish stories, and that occurs in some unexpected and
imaginative ways.
Someone could argue that this film is my own dad's story, in a way.
Just like the Billy Crudup character, we worshipped our tale-tellin' dad
until we were old enough to realize that everything he said was not even
true. Then we kind of avoided him for about a decade. We felt kind of
betrayed, because we were some kind of Blade Runner child, running
around with a head full of false memory implants, completely unaware
of the location of the line between myth and reality.
We wouldn't say he was a liar, because a liar expects people to believe
him, and our dad would have been insulted if anyone thought any
aspect of his stories was believable. That would imply a lack of
imagination and humor on his part. In addition, "liar" is an ugly word
which implies that somebody deceives others for his own gain. Our dad
had no ulterior motives, nothing beyond laughter, and his stories never
hurt anyone. Still, we believed them when we were five, just like kids
believe in Santa Claus, and then there came a point in our life when we
realized that we believed in a lot of falsehoods.
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