Rating: 6.5/10
Review date: June 8, 2003
A clownfish named Marlin lost his wife and 399 eggs to a barracuda attack. The only survivor is Nemo who has a smaller right fin compared to the normal size. Marlin�s over-protectiveness over Nemo caused the latter to sneak off on his own where he was captured by a dentist and put inside an aquarium.
The desperate Marlin embarks on a journey to find Nemo (thus the title of the movie) where he met a trusty sidekick named Dory. Meanwhile Nemo and his newfound aquarium friends are also thinking of a way to escape to the ocean.
As per usual, Pixar products are filled with colorful characters and interesting storyline against a beautiful backdrop which is the ocean in this case.
But then, I somehow feel that Finding Nemo falls short of achieving the usual standard that Pixar usually achieve in its previous animations. While there are certainly a variety of characters, they are not developed enough to make the audience feel memorable with the exception of Marlin, Nemo, Dory and maybe Gill.
The movie does seem to drag at certain parts and I personally feel that the pace is somewhat slower than the pervious Pixar films. The so-called �action� sequences are also not as exciting as they can be when compared to Toy Story for example. Perhaps this is due to the fact that the movie took place in the ocean so not much variation can be achieved during the chase sequences.
The voice actors are excellent as usual with their funny dialogues which the audience will certainly love. Again most notably are the actors for Marlin (Albert Brooks) as a desperate father looking for his son, Dory (Ellen DeGeneres) as the rather absent-minded companion for Marlin and Nemo (Alexander Gould) himself.
There are quite a few excellent jokes such as the one where Nemo and Dory stumbled into Bruce and his two companions who are trying hard to stop eating other fishes or even when Gill outlined his plan to escape from the confinement of the aquarium in the dentist�s office back to the open sea in an attempt to prevent Nemo from being �tortured� by the dentist�s niece, Darla.
Regardless of its beautiful animation, funny remarks and great voice acting, Finding Nemo unfortunately suffers from a lack of energy in some of its scenes while also failing to provide a deeper character development to make them memorable. By the way, I�m sure you will have good laugh with the short movie titled Knick Knack (attached at the beginning of Finding Nemo) about a snowman who is trying to get out of his globe.
Memorable quote: �Fish are our friends, not food.�
-Barry Humphries as Bruce (voice)-
(c) Martin Taidy 2003