Saturday, April 18, 2015

Big Fish


RATING: B+

Tim Burton is a guy who has always polarized me. Some of his films I enjoy a lot, and others I have mixed feelings on, and others I just struggled to not be overcome by the "weird factor." Because that is exactly what Tim Burton thrives upon, is making movies with an element of weirdness or quirkiness to them. Some feature these elements more prominently than others. (His version of Batman is perhaps the lone exception I can think of.) 

This film is hardly any different, to a degree. At the same time, though, it is quite different for him. The film focuses on a dying old man who enjoys telling tales... tall tales. Tall tales that although they're (mostly) good stories, there's some weird oddities about them; some things don't make sense, and they don't exactly conform to reality. 

Hmm. Sound familiar? 

One could argue that Tim Burton is simply making a film about himself--or a likeness of himself, anyway--and perhaps that was a little bit deliberate. That's not the main point, however. The main point is this: the dying storyteller's son is trying to see the truth behind the "lies" that his father tells, and reconcile with/understand his father before he dies.

Edward Bloom, the storyteller character, does have some quirky stories to tell about himself for sure. Whether it's a story about himself growing so fast it's visibly noticeable, a story involving a giant and an impossibly hidden weird town, or a story involving escaping the war with a pair of conjoined twins, there's always something quirky going on. At least that's how it goes for much of the first two-thirds of the film. 

Things take a rather surprising shift after that, though, as the son begins to uncover the "truth" of sorts, over time. Instead of sticking to the fantasy/quirkiness that Burton's known for, we end up sticking to reality for much of the final third of the film, and eventually we get to the ending, which is easily the film's high point, and... well, I won't say too much to avoid spoilers, but it's not too hard to guess how the film will be resolved on one degree. On another degree, we end up getting blown away when we finally do realize the "truth" about Bloom and his stories for ourselves. 

There is a thing or two in this film that is somewhat ridiculous. One of the stories that Bloom tells includes how he meets his wife--whom he meets by ringing her doorbell and saying, "You don't know me but my name's Edward Bloom and I love you." I know we're supposed to suspend disbelief, and I can do that for a lot of things in this film. Here, though, it's hard to not just start laughing as what amounts to basically stalking/harassment ensues, and somehow the guy still gets the girl. 

But I can't be too critical. After all, this is Tim Burton we're talking about. The guy knows how to make you scratch your head at times. Still, though, he can make a fairly decent film most of the time. This one easily ranks up in the upper echelon of those films. Exploring the lines between reality and fantasy sure seemed to work well for him in this one. 

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