ANDREW STANTON, LEE UNKRICH

Bil’s rating (out of 5):  BBBB.  

Australia/USA, 2003.  Pixar Animation Studios, Walt Disney Pictures.  Story by Andrew Stanton, Screenplay by Andrew Stanton, Bob Peterson, David Reynolds.  Cinematography by Sharon Calahan, Jeremy Lasky.  Produced by Graham Walters.  Music by Thomas Newman.  Production Design by Ralph Eggleston.  Film Editing by David Ian Salter.  

A clown fish (Albert Brooks) loses his only son to a scuba diver and must travel across the entire ocean to find him. He teams up with a wisecracking blue fish (Ellen DeGeneres) with a severe short-term memory problem who turns out to be more of a hindrance in his mission than any kind of help. While traversing the deep oceans of the world, however, Brooks discovers new passion for living and a sense of inner peace that he has never had before. The delightful adventure he goes on includes surfing turtles, vegetarian sharks, one-track minded seagulls and noble hearted pelicans. Meanwhile, Nemo is living in the aquarium of an Australian dentist and meeting some terrific characters in it. The animation is absolutely stunning and the two leads have a marvelous chemistry between them, but even with the assortment of characters common to these movies, the story is uneven and doesn’t sparkle the way A Bug’s Life and Toy Story 2 did.   Less-than-great Pixar is still a better experience than, say, an excellent Dreamworks cartoon, so don’t avoid it; besides, is there anything funnier in the world than listening to DeGeneres try to talk like a whale?

Academy Award:  Best Animated Feature
Nominations: Best Original Screenplay; Best Sound Editing; Best Original Score

European Film Award Nomination:  Screen International Award

Golden Globe Award Nomination:  Best Picture-Musical/Comedy

Toronto International Film Festival:  2003