The Fish Tale turns Sakana-kun's autobiography into a beautifully whimsical movie (Film review)

The kind of sight that the protagonist of The Fish Tale would love :)

 

The Fish Tale (Japan, 2022)

- Part of the Hong Kong International Film Festival's Fantastic Beats program

- Shuichi Okita, director and co-scriptwriter (with Shiro Maeda)

- Starring: Non, Yuya Yugira, Kaho, Haruka Ikagawa, Sakana-kun

 

Back in 2018, I viewed a film by Shuichi Okita about an eccentric artist who scarcely ventured beyond his house and home for the last two decades of his life.  Although Mori, the Artist's Habitat can seem on the fanciful side, it appears that its director was largely faithful to the facts when telling the story of Morikazu Kumagai.  But when it came to adapting the autobiography of celebrity ichthyologist Sakana-kun (Mr Fish) into a movie, it appears that Okita opted for a much more imaginative approach.    

 

How else to account for The Fish Tale's protagonist being identifiably male (by way of his wearing a uniform that marked him out as a schoolboy rather than schoolgirl) but be played by females (notably, as a young adult, by the long-haired, slender-bodied actress who goes by just one name: Non)?  (By the way, it's interesting to see the confusion this causes -- with different reviewers of the film referring to its lead character as male and others female!) 

 

Okita's non-binary emphasis also can be gleaned from the first line that appears in this offering: "A girl or a boy, it doesn’t matter".  How's that for a clear statement of intent that The Fish Tale is not going to be a conventional film?!  Something else that points to the movie opting for a creative approach: although Sakana-kun's real name is Masayuki Miyazawa, the film's main character gets referred throughout it as Meebo (which, from what I can tell, is also actually a made-up name!).  

 

Still, to judge from Sakana-kun deigning to appear in the movie as -- what else? -- an eccentric fish enthusiast who the young Meebo meets and inspires her to want to grow up to become a "fish expert", this approach appears to have his stamp of approval.  And I must say that it has mine too because The Fish Tale really is a lovely, sweet and heartwarming as well as enjoyably whimsical film which planted a smile on my face as well as had me shedding tears of joy!  

 

Plot-wise The Fish Tale is fairly predictable: with the coming of age tale spending some time showing Meebo as an unconventional young child, then a free spirited high schooler, then a sweet odd ball of a young adult.  What can be interesting though are some of the omissions: e.g., at some point, the family of four that Meebo of becomes a household of two -- with Meebo and his mother, Michiko (Haruka Igawa), living apart from his father and brother -- before Meebo strikes out on his own.  

 

Adding color and extra dimensionality to Meebo and his story are the friends he makes, including Momoko (played both as a high schooler and young adult by Kaho) and Hiyo (played as a high school tough and respectable adult by Yuya Yagira), who -- like his mother -- accept Meebo's many quirks, including, of course his obsession with marine life (because, actually, Meebo loves octopi and squid as well as fish).  Also, truly, there are a lot of delightful details in what's essentially a story of someone who could have been a shunned fish out of water but, by being showered with support and love, becomes -- okay, mixed metaphors here but bear with me here! -- more swan than ugly duckling!   

 

One last quirk to point out in this review about this film: Meebo loves to look at, sketch and paint marine life but also to EAT it.  This might strike those unfamiliar with the Japanese as particularly strange.  But as a joke goes: when you go to Japanese aquariums, you will hear people "ooh-ing" and "aah-ing" about how beautiful, cool and cute the sea life is but you also are very likely to hear the word oishi (delicious) being uttered as well as kawaii (cute) and sugoi (amazing)!  So, in some ways, The Fish Tale might seem like it is depicting a fantasy world but, in others, it's actually very Japanese!

 

My rating for this film: 8