Year: 2010
Director(s): Ariel Shullman & Henry Joost
Country: US
Language: English
In our current age of information there is a wealth of knowledge that is available at our fingertips 24/7. We also have more efficient ways of communicating with people, whether they are in the same city or half the world away. With Skype, texting, chat-rooms, online gaming etc. you can talk to whoever you wish at any given moment, you can even make instantaneous friends. However there is a dark side to unlimited communication; some people on the internet aren't who they say they are, some people are catfish.
Catfish is a documentary, in which two Young filmmakers (Ariel Schullman & Henry Joost) film their colleague's (Nev Shullman) budding online friendship with a young woman (Angela Wesselman) and her family which leads to an unexpected series of discoveries.
The discoveries? The entire family was a fabrication, a lie made up by a middle aged woman who regrets her decisions in life. This may be a spoiler, however I believe that the journey to this remarkable discovery is more important than the ending.The film begins as a light hearted romance, unravels into a suspenseful horror flick and then becomes a deeper voyage into the soul of the troubled. Even though I somewhat knew what was going to happen, Catfish still surprised me in ways that few documentaries have.
There is some debate regarding whether or not Catfish is actually a documentary, some believe many scenes feel staged and that there are just too many coincidences. However what we see on the silver screen has been severely edited and there was likely 100+ hours of footage on the cutting room floor. Even if this is a work of fiction, it's still pretty good & serves both as a warning and as a humanitarian message. The filmmakers could have easily turned Angela into a monster, but chose to seek the humanity within.
In conclusion, throughout the fairly short running time Catfish had me on the edge of my seat. What was going to happen next? How would Nev find out? Who would be behind the lies? The picture contained more twists than a pretzel, but each contributed greatly to the overall story. This is a fantastic documentary. Praise it! 4/5
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