During my trip to Medicine Hat a couple weeks ago, I saw Big Fish at the Cineplex Odeon. I must admit that the hype building up to its release raised expectations and therefore, in reality, the movie didn’t live up to the great movie I anticipated. Tim Burton was heavy on style and light on character development. The main problem of the story was that the main character, the father who tells tall tales, had nothing to overcome in the movie. Instead it was his son, who by definition was the protagonist, that had the problem to overcome. The movie just didn’t have that much impact on me, because the son’s obstacle – or the antagonistic part of the movie – was just learning to understand his father. That being said, the second half of the movie (or even last quarter) did a lot in the way of redeeming the movie because finally the protagonist was featured and (spoiler alert – like you didn’t already know) the son in fact reconciles with his father and consequently comes to understand him.
Tim Burton makes lovely films – and Big Fish is no exception. Even though I saw the film and was somewhat disspointed, everytime I see the ads I can’t help but feel like I want to see it again. It’s doing well at the box office and I’m certain that Big Fish will have a tremendous cult following much like Tim Burtons other films. So if you’re tempted to go (I don’t blame you) take my advice not to sea the movie in theatres, instead get the reel deal by saving your money and catching Big Fish on DVD.