feotakahari

This is not an easy movie to defend. It’s a comedy in which most of the jokes aren’t funny. If you take it seriously, it’s hard to root for Oscar because most of his problems are his own fault. And you can’t just sit back and let the visuals wash over you, because human faces on fish bodies are deep in the uncanny valley.

Lenny is a shark who doesn’t want to eat fish, and the farther the movie progresses, the more blatantly this is treated as a metaphor for being gay. When the whole stack of cards comes tumbling down, this is what Oscar has to say to Lenny’s father:

“What is your problem?! So your son likes kelp, so his best friend is a fish, so he likes to dress like a dolphin! So what?! Everybody loves him, just the way he is. Why can’t you?“

This was revolutionary in 2004, and I think it redeems the movie.