Get ready for today’s…Blast from the Past!
From Andrew Stanton, the Oscar-winning director of “WALL-E” (2008), and “Finding Dory” (2016), comes this charming animated feature…
Dory: “When life gets you down, you know whatcha gotta do?”
Marlin: “Whatcha gotta do?”
Dory: (singing) “Just keep swimming, just keep swimming, just keep swimming swimming swimming, what do we do? We swim, swim…”.
“Finding Nemo” was released on this day May 30th 2003, making the film 15 years old as of today.
Taking a note from similar-themed films such as “An American Tail” (1986), and possibly numerous others, the film follows Marlin (voiced by Oscar nominee Albert Brooks), a timid clown fish father who sets out on a life-changing journey to find his adventurous son Nemo (voiced by Alexander Gould), hence the title, after being captured by divers and taken to Sydney, Australia. Along the way, Marlin meets the scene-stealing character of the film Dory (voiced by Golden Globe nominee Ellen DeGeneres) an easily excitable regal blue tang fish with short term memory loss, who helps him throughout his journey.
Fun fact; the film is listed as being #10 in the AFI’s (American Film Institute) 10 Top 10 list of animated films. The film also unsurprisingly won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature, and was nominated for Best Original Screenplay – Andrew Stanton (screenplay/story), Bob Peterson (screenplay), and David Reynolds (screenplay), Best Original Score – Thomas Newman, and Best Sound Editing – Gary Rydstrom and Michael Silvers, making it 1 win out of 4 nominations.
Some of the film’s highlights include the endearing yet slightly overused narrative, messages, quotable one-liners, gorgeous animation, fun characters, excellent voice performances; particularly Brooks, DeGeneres, and others such as Oscar nominee Willem Dafoe, and Oscar winners Geoffrey Rush and Allison Janney, and the beautiful and emotionally powerful music score by Newman.
On a personal note, this was one of the films that I watched countless times at the cinema.
If you are looking for a delightful family film, then this is for you, or for anyone you know, who likes the aforementioned aspects.
Recommended to fans of Disney and animation.
Poster design and artwork: Unknown.