I don't understand the effect that the film Big Fish has on me.
Tonight I watched it again. Actually, it was more like I half-watched it. But as soon as they start talking about going to the river, I start crying.
My son was watching it with me, interrupting to talk about playing Zelda after the film and he said he started crying too. Then as the credits role we're both acting like nothing happened.
It seems we were both allowing our attention to drift away from watching Big Fish yet it managed to extract moisture from our tear ducts in final scenes. It's quite magical to me how it can do this but so is the film I guess. There are many memorable images in it, yet they're vaguely familiar. Maybe it's the symbolism?
One of the things that resonates for me while watching Big Fish is that it's a film about becoming a father and how it changes your own relationship with your father. This is one of the best things about having kids for me because I found I could let go of a lot of angst once I started to see things from the viewpoint of being a parent.
