Blu-Ray Review: Controversial ‘Catfish’ Examines Identity in the Internet Age

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CHICAGO – It almost felt like Universal tried to piggyback “Catfish,” recently released on Blu-ray and DVD, on to so many other movies that it somewhat tanked at the box office (not breaking even $4 million) because it lost its own identity; ironic, given the film’s purported examination of the shifting ground of truth known as the internet.

HollywoodChicago.com Blu-Ray Rating: 3.5/5.0
Blu-Ray Rating: 3.5/5.0

Trying to mimic the word-of-mouth campaign of “Paranormal Activity” while also being called “The Other Facebook Movie” (to David Fincher’s “The Social Network”) and eventually falling into rumors of the most bizarre trend of 2010 by being a documentary with questions of validity (like “I’m Still Here” and “Exit Through the Gift Shop”), I wasn’t sure what to expect going into “Catfish”. I’m still not sure what to think of it, which is something of a problem. Or is it?

What is “Catfish”? What’s the point? If we take the film at face value, it is a documentary about a man who befriends a talented little girl who makes paintings of his photos (why this would ever be the subject of a documentary without the “drama” that follows isn’t clear and leads to the first of many questions about the film’s truth) and gets drawn into the girl’s family life via Facebook. He starts up something of a relationship with the older sister and goes to Michigan to surprise her. He finds something very unexpected there.

Catfish was released on Blu-Ray and DVD on January 4th, 2011.
Catfish was released on Blu-Ray and DVD on January 4th, 2011.
Photo credit: Universal Home Video

Or does he? I have to admit to never quite buying “Catfish.” There are just too many questions about what the filmmakers knew and when they knew it to take it completely at face value and, of course, the scant special feature on the Blu-ray (an interview with the “star” of the film and the two men who shot him on-camera and get director credit) offers little insight into those questions. It may not be as completely a put-on as “I’m Still Here” but I’m not 100% sure that it’s far off.

So, then what? If it’s all an act, is the point of “Catfish” really that people are not what they seem online? They could have called it “Duh.” Welcome to the new millennium. It seems somewhat facile to make a documentary that sets up such a ruse to point out that the person you’re talking to online may not be completely (or really even slightly) honest.


Then there’s the worst possibility and the one that tempts me to pan “Catfish” and why some critics have done so — that these three men knew about the trouble in Michigan and that’s why cameras started rolling in the first place. That would mean that they basically took advantage of a mentally unstable and emotionally-charged situation in an attempt to make a hit movie. That’s exploitative and reprehensible.

As these questions of the very purpose of “Catfish” float through my mind, I have to admit that there’s something to be said for a movie that provokes any kind of discussion or thought about its very goal. Is “Catfish” purposefully unfocused in an attempt for viewers to take from it what they will? Approach it as a mystery, an examination of life online, a commentary on the new dating paradigm — is it a problem that the directors themselves never seemed to make a choice? I’m not sure if I even like or loathe “Catfish” but I can’t say that I wasn’t riveted and don’t enjoy swirling it around in my brain. Maybe that’s all they wanted in the first place and all that really matters. In an online world where identity is so undefined perhaps a film’s intention about that world should be similarly hazy. Decide for yourself.

Special Features:
o Secrets Revealed: Exclusive Interviews With the Filmmakers
o BD-Live

“Catfish” was directed by Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman and “stars” Yaniv Schulman. It was released on Blu-ray and DVD on January 4th, 2011. It is rated PG-13 and runs 87 minutes.

HollywoodChicago.com content director Brian Tallerico

By BRIAN TALLERICO
Content Director
HollywoodChicago.com
brian@hollywoodchicago.com

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