Billy Crudup and Albert Finney in Big Fish, photo courtesy Columbia Pictures
Big Fish (2003)
Edward Bloom (Albert Finney) is a big, fat liar. For years, Ed’s told the tallest of tall tales: How he left home in the company of a giant, how he joined the circus run by a werewolf, how he caught a gigantic catfish using his wife’s wedding ring as bait on the day that his son Will was born.
Will (Billy Crudup) is sick of the stories. Sick of the lies. He loved them as a kid, but now he wants something more from his father, something real. “Dad,” Will says, “I have no idea who you are because you have never told me a single fact.”
But as Ed can’t seem to do it. And as he spins out his stories one more time—one last time—and Will begins to snag bits of Ed’s real life, Will discovers that, to his surprise, he still loves those stories. They made his father who he was.
As his father dies, Will spins his own story—the story of his father’s last moments. How he returned to his old, mythical haunts, how he was surrounded by friends “Everybody’s there, and I mean everybody,” Will says, even though Edward’s stuck in a hospital room, an oxygen tube strapped to his nose. “And the strange thing is, there’s not a sad face to be found. everyone’s just so happy to see you.”
The son understands his father at last, and he gives him a final gift: Will joins his father in his own world and gives him one more story.
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