Is it at all possible that Shark Tale could surpass the mega-hit status the Shrek series of films has seem to have hit plus eat up Finding Nemo-like numbers? While, both those questions are highly unlikely Shark Tale was a surprisingly good time for me considering I expected very little.
Big names don’t exactly sell an animated feature considering you are only getting voice familiarity of famous actors not the whole package. That said, the lesser known names are the ones that carry the majority of the comedy in this fishy little tale.
Shark Tale tells the story of Oscar (Smith) a little fish with big dreams, who hopes to somehow make it big one day so he can stop working at the Whale Wash and begin making his fortune. While getting himself in and out of trouble he suddenly finds himself in the hero role as he is assumed to be a shark slayer.
Oscar eats up the attention but suddenly finds himself as the mob’s, a.k.a. the shark’s, number one target.
Will Smith delivers his expected jokes and Renee Zellweger and Angelina Jolie play to their strengths as one portrays quite the innocent fish while the other is the gold digging guppy with her own theme song.
The highlights here are the characters voiced by Martin Scorsese and Doug E. Doug and Ziggy Marley. Doug and Marley play a couple of Rastafarian jelly fish while Scorsese has the task of playing quite the talkety-talky puffer fish and all three carry the largest laughs throughout the film.
Shark Tale won’t blow anyone’s socks off, but it also won’t disappoint. There is enough comedy and a good enough story to keep audiences entertained for the duration, but on the flipside of the coin there are sure to be a couple of fires brewing in the politically correct waters considering the mob bosses are played by Italians and the undersea cabbies are played by Middle Eastern drivers.
Pushing all the negativity aside families are sure to enjoy Shark Tale and so is pretty much everyone else for that matter, but as far as DreamWorks finding their new animation tent pole beyond Shrek I think they better keep looking, considering getting 10 top name actors isn’t going to be as cheap the second time around, and that is if you consider a production budget of an estimated $75 million for the first turn cheap.
