March 1, 2010: Miracle Fish
Unfortunately, Miracle Fish has been deteriorating in my memory since I saw it, which is a shame since at the time, aside from a few points, I thought it was pretty good.
Miracle Fish is an Australian live-action short-film Oscar nominee for 2009, running about 17 minutes. Walking a fine line between clarifying itself as either real or a dream, it starts out innocently enough with a mother dropping off her son at school, but quickly veers into mystical territory as the boy wakes from a nap in the nurse’s office and finds the school deserted.
Despite initially thinking that alien abduction is to blame, after quite some time during which he enjoys some fun and games in the empty halls, the boy eventually learns that the school is deserted because there’s a crazy gunman running loose. Using the titular cheap plastic cellophane “miracle” fish the boy had received earlier that day from his mother as a birthday gift, he accurately predicts the demise of the gunman, in a climax which will scar the boy for life, and possibly some viewers as well.
The film is generally very quiet, which is a gutsy technique in general but can be more easily made to work in short film territory. Perhaps it was the slow start, or the lack of clarity around what the film was about, which left me cold. However, there’s still plenty to experience here, and the Oscar nomination was well deserved.
Strange mix of magic and reality.
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