Finding Nemo Analysis

1

• Finding Nemo Analysis

Thesis Through their adventures, the paranoid
father learns not to micro-manage his sons
life, and the son learns the values of
initiative and teamwork.
2

• By
• Dawn Castlebury- PowerPoint Presentation, Plot
  Summary, Colors, Light vs. Shadow.
• Kelly Felts- List of Characters, Camera Angles,
  Scene Summary.
• Lashanda Jones- Props, Costumes, Blocking.
• Sara Burton- Setting, Sounds, Music.

3
Characters

• Nemo- Marlin Corals surviving son
  (protagonist) learns to survive in the open
  oceanand the value of home.
• Marlin
• Dori- Befriends Marlin and helps him find Nemo
  forgetful and impetuous
• Coral- Nemos mother who dies in attack with all
  her eggs but one
• Crush-The big, old turtle who teaches Marlin to
  let kids struggle a bit on their own Squirts
  pop
• Squirt- One of the baby turtles Crushs son
• Mr. Rays- Manta Ray Nemos teacher
• Bruce- Biggest shark who struggles with Fish are
  friends, not food.                       Tank
  Gang
• Gill-big, scarred fish clever but grim
• Blow-blowfish who inflates when startled
• Jacque- crab compulsive cleaner
• Auntie Deb- blue fish with stripes
• Peach-starfish and lookout
• Darla-destructive metal-mouth niece of the
  dentist
• Nigel- the pelican that hears of Marlins quest
  and saves Nemo from the seagulls

4
Plot Summary

• Nemo, a young clownfish is caught by a scuba
  diver when he ventures into the open ocean and is
  taken to an aquarium in a dentists office. While
  Marlin, his father, overcomes his fears of the
  ocean to find his lost son, he meets Dory, who
  has a very short memory. Marlin and Dory search
  for Nemo, encountering many types of ocean life.
  Eventually news spreads about Marlins quest and
  Nigel, a pelican, comes to the tank to rescue
  Nemo and reunite him with his father.

5
Setting

• Finding Nemo is set in the ocean between the
  home of Marlin and the East Australian Current
  and the Australian dentists office in Sydney.
  The story of a lost child and his fathers
  adventure and mission to reunite them is all
  depicted and played out in this vast area of the
  southern Pacific. Overall, the director used the
  ocean as a microcosm to satirize human foibles
  while showing a quest for serenity.

6
Scene "News Travels"

• In SCENE 17, Nemo has been placed into the
  fish tank by the dentist. After he is
  ceremonially welcomed to the tank, Gill reveals
  his plan for escapewhich requires a small,
  strong fish.  The tank gang has to act before
  Nemo is given to Darla, an insensitive human girl
  who kills fish just by looking at them (and
  shaking them to get them to perform for her.
• Nemos dad, Marlin, a clown fish has told other
  fish about his quest to find Nemo and those fish
  told more fish who tell more. Finally, the
  pelican, Nigel, who has met Nemo, hears the story
  and alerts the tank gang. Nigel rescues Nemo and
  Dory, who has found him after splitting with
  Marlin, and gets them to the harbor near the
  dentists office. Nemo plays dead in order to
  get rinsed into the sewer system that eventually
  vents into the harbor, where he runs into Dory,
  who leads him back to Marlin. In the end, Nemo
  not only rescues himself, but he also rescues
  Dory with his fathers trust and aid.

7
Sound Effects

• Sound effects during this particular scene of
  the film help foster realism and set the scene
  shift. Specific sounds are heard while in the
  East Australian Current (EAC) with the quick
  moving of the water and the sounds of each sea
  turtle. A specific sound of Dory and Marlin
  exiting the EAC is heard, and then a quiet lull
  is present. The quietness helps with the
  transition of setting from the current to Sydney
  harbor. Bubbling, waves, seagulls barking, and
  Dory and Marlins swim are an example of the
  specific sounds that are heard during this scene.
  The DVD reveals that the sound of Nemos
  malformed fin was made with fluttering tissue
  paper.

8
Sounds

• During the movie sound and sound effects are
  an essential part of the development and
  progression of this movie. Disney uses multiple
  sounds to depict characters and to essentially
  describe the ocean in sound. With many of the
  main characters a specific sound is used to
  identify the character.
• Nemo is identified by his damaged fin. The fin
  makes a distinctive fluttering sound, which
  establishes that he has less use of this fin.
• Marlin, the overprotective father of Nemo has a
  very fast moving tail. One could say that this
  shows how neurotic and overprotective his father
  is.
• Dory, the companion of Marlin on his mission to
  find Nemo, has a smooth glide to her fins and
  tail. This shows that she is going through life
  with a good attitude and enjoying everything she
  does with no concerns. This also shows her
  mental flightiness (amnesia).
• Each shark has a deep protruding voice showing
  dominance and strength.

9
Props

• 1st Setting in the Scene The Ocean
• Leaves, flowers, sand, rocks, and a treasure
  chest set the scene in the open ocean.

• 2nd Setting in the Scene The Harbor
• Trees, bushes, land, boulders in the water,
  boats, and the Sydney Opera House in the distance
  set Sydney Harbor.

3rd Setting in the Scene The Tank In the fish
tank, an old rusted container, blue, rocks,
bubbles, plastic pink tall plants, a sea shell
with a pink ball inside, tall plastic green
plants, the filter, and beyond the glass the
dentists chair and tools, his patients,
cabinets, pictures on the wall. The window
overlooks the harbor, and Nigel.
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Costumes
Semi-Realistic Cartoon Animations of the
Underwater World

• Dori
• blue fish
• yellow tail
• big eyes that blink blankly to show her
  forgetfulness
• Seagulls
• short beaks to bark Mine!
• wings
• small, blank eyes
• Fish
• Different colors for different species
• Dolphins
• grey and white
• long bodies

• Nemo's father (Marlin)
• orange white with a outline of black on fins
• big white eyes
• small framed mouth
• Nemo
• small orange fish
• orange, white and with a little trim of black
• Turtles
• green, with a darker green in certain areas
  on shells
• Crabs
• orange yellow, and small, green
• with claws pincers
• Pelicans
• long wings
• long faces

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Light vs. Shadow

• There were shadows of the sea life on the ocean
  floor from the sunlightwhich took a lot of trial
  and error by the animators.
• There were also reflections on the ocean from the
  sun, stars, moon, and the city lights.
• The most effective scene was the initiation
  ceremony to welcome Nemo into the tank in order
  to establish him as a member of the escape team.

12
Colors

• The colors in Finding Nemo were mostly shades of
  blue and green, since it takes place underwater.
• The underwater plant life consisted of all
  different colors such as, purple, green, pink,
  yellow and many other colors.
• The characters (fish) were the most colorful from
  the bright orange clownfish and the blue and
  yellow blue tang fish.
• One effective scene showed a meeting of the
  sharks that used gray shades for their sinister
  environment to show they differ from the brightly
  colored fish.

13
Camera Angles

• The camera angles under the water are mostly
  looking from a side view, sometimes straight at
  the characters in order to show their normalcy.
• Sometimes, the camera looks down into the water,
  reminding us the usual perspective we humans see
  from the world above.
• Shots from the tank sometimes show Nemo, as well
  as the marina outside the dentists window in
  Sydney harbor.
• Many of the shots in the tank look down at the
  characters to show their smallness, especially
  Nemo in the filter tube but some shots look out
  into the dentists office to help establish that
  the fish are familiar with his procedures and
  tools, so they must have been there for a long
  time, which implies a sinister future for Nemo.

14
Blocking

• Selected positions for scene 17In the EAC
• The fluid motions of the turtles show how they
  have adapted to traveling in the swift Eastern
  Australian Current.
• Marlins confusion and Squirts getting bumped
  out of the current show the speed of the current,
  as well as the contrast between the harbor and
  the current after Marlin and Dory have exited.
• Inside the whale
• The rush of water and the rolling of Dory and
  Marlin on the whales tongue establish the danger
  of their situation, which Marlin and the audience
  feel, but Dory ignores because she is fascinated
  by the experience as she learns to speak whale.

• The Crab vs. the Seagulls
• When a crab is tossed into the center of a bunch
  of seagulls, humor and irony follow.
• The crab on the rock, though surrounded, is not
  defenseless. The gulls fear his snapping claw and
  eventually lose him as he escapes into the water.
• The stupidity of the gulls is established when
  all of them shout Mine!with one shouting
  Mine! even after the crab has escaped into the
  water.

15
More Positions and Movement

• The Pelican vs. the Dentist
• One wacky scene, involving a lot of slapstick,
  shows Nigel, the pelican, loose in the dentists
  office, creating chaos.
• The mismatch between the pelican and the
  dentists tools, glass cabinets, and his
  frustration at not being able to keep the bird
  off his equipment all create a mad scene.
• Nemo vs. the Filter
• The contrast between Nemos first, unsuccessful
  attempt to stop the filter and his second,
  successful attempt makes Nemo look even braver.
• Especially when Nemo struggles up the tube, we
  can see his fear the first time and his
  determination the last time.