Catfish

I have to admit that I surprised myself by not seeking out the twist in the movie Catfish before seeing it. I will, however, probably spoil it in this post so, if you don’t want to know what the twist is, leave now.

Catfish is the Griffin and Sabine of the aughts of this new millennium. Nev Schulman is a young aspiring photographer in New York who gets lucky and has one of his photographs used by a newspaper. Out of the blue he receives a painting of that photo by Abby Pierce, an 8-year old art prodigy in Michigan. The pair become Facebook friends and soon Nev is introduced to Abby's mother Angela and her older sister Megan. More paintings of Nev's photos arrive at his house including one of Angela who is a beautiful woman. But it is Megan's Facebook photos that capture Nev's attention. She is 19 and gorgeous.

Nev and Megan begin an Internet relationship which struck a chord in Nev's brother Ariel and their friend Henry. They decide to make a documentary about Nev's long-distance lust. Megan's sultry voice lures Nev like a siren song and she posts MP3s of songs she performed for him. Their chat sessions are steamy and they chat on the phone to work over plans to meet in person. Megan's shows artistic promise in her music but she also lives a very different life from Nev. Rural Michigan and New York are two very different places. Nev seems enthralled with her life on a farm where she raises horses and bakes pies.

But then things begin to not add up. Abby is mysteriously never around for Nev to chat with and Megan's song are revealed to actually be by others. Just who are the Pierces? Nev, Ariel, and Harry travel to Colorado to photograph a dance troup in action and, on the way back, they decide to head to Ishpeming (Yes, the Pierces are Yoopers, doncha know) to find out once and for all what Nev has gotten himself into.

They roll into town around 2:30AM and stop by Megan's horse ranch only to find no horses and the postcards Nev sent her still in the mailbox with "Return to Sender" stamped on them. After a night's sleep, the trio head to Angela's house to confront her and get some answers. And they get them. (Spoilers ahead.)

The revelation is that there is an Abby but she is no art prodigy. Instead all of the paintings of Nev's photographs were done by Angela, who turns out to be nothing like the painting Nev received. She is at the cusp of middle age and isn't a size 0 as the painting portrayed. She is married to Vince and Abby is their daughter. However, they also live with Vince's two adult sons from his previous marriage who are mentally retarded. But, perhaps worst of all, there is no Megan. The whole thing was a ruse.

It was an interesting confrontation. City slickers and small town folk; a young man just starting out in life pursuing his dreams and a middle-aged woman who harbors some regrets at never having chased after hers. Nev's anger is tempered by the fact that he was taken in by someone with no malicious intent. Angela is pitiful in her own way but also comes across as being a very strong individual, especially when contrasted with Nev. It's not that the protagonist is weak but he's a young bachelor looking to sow his oats while Angela is older with many more responsibilities, more scars, and has made sacrifices in her life in addition to commitments. She has an air of desperation for having concocted a complex online set of personas but, for me, Nev is just as desperate. He's young; he wants to get laid and will do whatever it takes even if the woman offering carnal favors is over 1,000 miles away.

I'm not sure what Catfish has to say as far as being a cautionary tale about social networking and the anonymity of the Internet. Sure there's Facebook and MP3s but otherwise this is a very universal tale that, with a few tweaks, could just as easily apply to the days before the Net. Desperation, confronting aging and assessing one's life, and simply reaching out to other human beings for attention and comfort aren't unique to our time. And I think on those terms Catfish works.