Tim Burton has been lambasted numerous times in the past as only caring about visuals, having characters that are nothing but caricatures, and in the case of BIG FISH, having characters that are only an excuse to segue into an exciting visual. Uh, wrong. There's more heart and soul in many of his films, namely EDWARD SCISSORHANDS, and our topic of discussion today, BIG FISH, than in most other movies that I can think of. Each one brings a tear to my eye, each one is extremely beautiful, emotionally and visually, and each one tells a bittersweet truth about humanity, while enveloping us in a completely fantastical world at the same time. I saw BIG FISH for the first time last night and I ain't gonna forget it any time soon. It's the story of a son, played by Billy Crudup, and a father, played by Albert Finney, whose life after his son's birth consists of nothing but telling the same blown-up stories again and again. This could be due to, or the result of, never being close to his son, and never being able to properly communicate with him (or people in general). Or it could just be a man blowing up the truth due to an unconscious dissatisfaction with settling down, and giving up the freedom of his youth. It could be a lot of things. He spins yarns of 15' tall giants, witches, werewolves, tuna-sized catfish, bank robberies, mysterious towns, circuses, the Korean war, Siamese twins, and on and on, and his son is sick of hearing it. He just wants his father to tell him the truth, and is particularly humorless about it all, even as his father lays on his deathbed. The stories are shown in incredible, often visually stunning flashbacks, with the quixotic Ewan McGregor as the young Edward Bloom, and I was very satisfied to see that Tim Burton is still using predominantly non-CGI special effects -- or, if they were CGI, they were tangible and extremely well-done. The final scenes will strike some as too sappy or manipulative, but I though the effect of the entire undertaking was profoundly beautiful, especially the ending which brings everything together in a bittersweet fashion that never struck me as too sentimental, too apparent, or too conventional. Hats off to Tim Burton, for this was one of the best of 2003, and without a doubt his best film since EDWARD SCISSORHANDS.
