Finding
Nemo
(2003)
(SPOILERS) As
the Pixar brand goes, Finding Nemo is
perhaps their most formulaic movie. It should therefore, by rights, also be
their most tired and repetitive in retrospect, particularly as it’s their most
overt example of studio hands (co-directors Andrew Stanton, who also gets sole
screenplay credit, and Lee Unkrich) working through the tribulations of
parentage, at least until Inside Out
came along. There is a cumulative
feeling at times that the studio is too honed, too precise and meticulous in
hitting all its carefully calculated beats, such that, no matter how individuated
the subject matter, the emotional content tends to be unvaried and identikit (the
most obvious fall out of this being The
Good Dinosaur). That’s probably partly because other studios are less
inclined to foreground such content, more equivocal about wearing their hearts
on their sleeves. It’s also because the John Lasseter command desk is so hawk-like
in its oversight, even Jeffrey Katzenberg might blanche. But Finding Nemo rides this wave of
stock-in-trades so well, and with such accompanying zest, while simultaneously providing
a breathlessly non-stop rollercoaster ride, it’s impossible to resist.
Nemo wouldn’t quite sit at the top of my Pixar pile
(the trio of WALL-E, The Incredibles and Ratatouille can be found there) but it’s near enough, thanks to a
screenplay that is not only wall-to-wall with inimitable supporting characters,
but also ensures the central ones are engaging and well-matched. Okay, Nemo
himself is pretty much your classic unreconstituted cute Disney muffin, the
baby elephant from The Jungle Book
given his own movie, but even he isn’t too cute to bear. And Marlin’s
over-protective father schtick might be just a little too over-exerted, if not
for being voiced by Albert Brooks, who manages to be effortlessly sarcastic and earnestly diligent within the space
of a breath. The picture, like many a Disney classic, opens dramatically with
high tragedy, so providing an effective grounding for Marlin’s angst. And,
over-earnest as he is, he’s proven right to be concerned, but as is always the
way, the journey is about his (re-) opening up to life rather than his son learning
caution.
It’s to the
credit of Stanton and Unkrich that they don’t pause long enough for the sentiments
to be worked over. I suspect they would indulge themselves, were the picture
made now (Finding Dory, certainly, is
more indulgent in that sphere). There’s a winning desire to make this a rousing
adventure first and underpinned by a genuinely-felt story second (or rather, it
is understood that the genuinely-felt story is the bedrock, and once established
the makers get to be as frivolous as they like), and I suspect that’s why it
remained top of the Pixar roost for such a long time. For me, the sincerity of Toy Story can get a bit ripe at times (I
think that’s mostly the stomach-churning Randy Newman factor, to be honest),
whereas Nemo rarely congratulates
itself over its own well-meaning.
Much of the
picture’s success is down to the perfectly batty vocal performance of Ellen DeGeneres,
whose Dory has an inspired, stream-of-consciousness looseness, aided and
abetted by perfect odd-couple pairing with Brooks; one is utterly guileless,
the other hopelessly guarded and highly-strung. It’s a classic double-act. And,
if the picture follows the quest format more doggedly and overtly than most, it
does so with such acumen for each new incident it’s impossible not to be swept
along.
At times
too, Nemo offers genuinely outstanding moments straddling tension and humour
unequalled in the Pixar canon, from the onset of a sea of jellyfish to the
encounter with an angler, and a sperm whale (“Wow, I wish I could speak whale”), or the beautifully sustained
tension/hilarity with a shark self-help group abstaining from eating fish.
Voiced by Barry Humphries, Bruce is a magnificently gregarious creation, even
when fighting bloodthirsty urges.
If there’s
occasionally a note of too-easy familiarity (the Stanton-voiced stoner turtle
Crush), there’s also giddy inspiration: the beady eyed seagulls out of an
Aardman production, all repeating “Mine!”
ad infinitum (and given a The Birds-style
gathering effect; not the only Hitchcock reference, see below), Nigel (Geoffrey
Rush), the pelican who continually finds his way into the dentist’s surgery (my
favourite sequence may be the pandemonium he causes there, fully unleashed, the
dentist at a loss as to explain what is going on) and the Mission: Impossible poignant presence of Willem Dafoe as the
tank-bound Gill, desperate to escape but having to remind himself there are limits.
The reliance on Antipodean accents is also very welcome, providing a splash of
colour and distinctive streak of humour.
Stanton
even seems conscious that he may be over-doing his cathartic parental
outpouring, hence the antidote to the harmless, lovable offspring in hideous
nightmare child Darla, the would-be recipient of Nemo, introduced with Psycho strings as the kind of kid you
absolutely do not trust with a pet
(the kind whose idea of stroking a cat is to see how far it will stretch before
breaking).
And, as if
it needs saying, the animation is absolutely gorgeous. It may be 13 years since
this came out, but to my eye it hasn’t aged a day (which can’t be said for Toy Story, showing how far the studio
came in only eight years, and how advances since then have been subtler). Did Finding Nemo need a sequel? Absolutely
not, but on the other hand it’s not one you think instantly think would be
spoil by revisiting. That said, its inarguable that, say, the run of
substandard Shrek sequels negatively
impacted what was a highly accomplished original. Coming Finding Fishy Four, everyone may have concluded Pixar should have
left well alone.
Agree? Disagree? Mildly or vehemently? Let me know in the comments below.
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