Ultimate Pixar Tribute- Movie #5: Finding Nemo

by Nick DeVito

Plot: When an over-protective father clownfish named Marlin (Albert Brooks) loses his son Nemo to some divers, he sets out on an epic journey to rescue his son back. Along the way, he meets a fish named Dory (Ellen DeGeneres), who suffers from short-term memory loss.

These two fish set off from their home in the Great Barrier Reef to Sydney, while encountering a blood-thirsty shark, a savage angler-fish, swarms of killer jelly fish, surfer-dude turtles, being swallowed by a whale, and being chased by an army of moronic seagulls.

Meanwhile, Nemo (who has been put in a fish tank for a dentist’s office), meets a band of new friends as they try to help him escape before the fish-killing dentist’s niece Darla comes to take him away. Eventually, Nemo escapes through a sink drain, and manages to find Dory after Marlin had given up on their great search, and abandoned her.

When they finally meet up again, a large fishing net captures hundreds of fish including Dory, and they must use their newly found skills to escape. They escape, and a few months later we learn that Marlin has finally learned how to be a good father, and an epilogue shows Nemo’s fish-tank friends escaping out of the dentist’s office.

Well: Finding Nemo was the first Pixar movie I got to see in theaters, and if you see one Pixar movie in theatres it has got to be Finding Nemo. I don’t think I need to explain this movie’s success too much, because chances are that you saw it too.

Finding Nemo quickly became the highest grossing animated movie of all time (for the time being, at least), and is currently the 19th highest grossing movie in the history of the box office (more than any other Pixar movie up until Toy Story 3's release).

Finally, Finding Nemo was also the movie that gave Pixar the much-deserved Oscar for Best Animated Picture. Unlike previous Pixar films that clearly relied more on laughs, Finding Nemo relied mostly on its heart. Sure Dory brings some of Pixar’s funniest moments of all time, but near the end she gives one of Pixar’s most heart wrenching speeches about her newly-found bond with Marlin. It blew away all expectations, and its scenes of incredible computer animation (mostly with the scenes at the coral reef) proved that Pixar could do anything.


The best character is without a doubt Dory; she’s completely insane but that’s why she’s so likeable. There’s a ton of great lines, but if I had to pick one it would be: “P. Sherman, 42 Wallaby Way, Sydney”. Ha! I remembered it too!

Easter-Eggs:

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• • John Ratzenberger: He plays the large school of shape-shifting fish.
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• • Pizza Planet truck: When Gill is telling his first escape plan, the truck is seen speeding down the street.
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• • A113: It can be seen on the diver’s camera.
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• • Mr. Ray is voiced by Bob Peterson, who went on to co-direct Up.
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• • A Buzz Lightyear action-figure is seen laying near the toy-box in the dentist’s waiting room.
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• • Crush the sea-turtle is voiced by director Andrew Stanton.
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• • The boy in the dentist’s waiting room is reading a comic book starring Mr. Incredible (star of Pixar’s next film “The Incredibles”).
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• • Jacques the shrimp is voiced by Joe Ranft who voiced Heimlich in A Bug’s Life and Wheezy in Toy Story 2.
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• • A boat is called “For the Birds” (Pixar’s previous short film).
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• • A boat is called “iBoat” (Steve Jobs produced Toy Story and co-founded Apple).
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• • The boat that blocked all of the charging seagulls is rumored to be called “Major Plot Point”, (which is what it literally is).
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• • In the final epilogue scene, a yellow Italian car is driving on the street; this is Luigi from the upcoming Pixar movie “Cars”.
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• • Mike Wazowski is seen swimming during the credits.
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Final Thoughts: Many people say that Finding Nemo is arguably still Pixar’s strongest film, and its animation looked so realistic that they had to make it slightly cruder to avoid people thinking they filmed scenes in an actual ocean. With an amazing score, a brilliant story, and a fantastic cast, Finding Nemo at the time was by far, Pixar’s best film ever. Besides, the “Just Keep Swimming” jingle got stuck in people’s heads for many years to come. I give Finding Nemo four anemones out of four. ****