William Bloom’s father, Edward, always told Edward fantastical stories of his life. When William is home to say goodbye to his father he wants to find out how much of the stories were true.

If you have never seen a Tim Burton movie one thing that pops up often in his films is the use of flashbacks! In Big Fish specifically, he uses the flash backs quite a lot to show the stories he had told his son about his life.The flashbacks always run in chronological order and never skips chunks of time, where as during the present time tends to skip around. For example the flashbacks start when Edward was young and follow back to back creating the story of his life. When the film she’s what is supposed to be present day in between flash backs it often has time jumps. One scene William is in his kitchen getting the new that his father is dying and then in the next he is on a plane. One last side note about the flashbacks is that when it switches from present day back to a flashback they all seem to be triggered by something in the present day scenes. One example would be William sees a small boy making shadows on a plane and we are taken back to when his dad make shadow puppets on his bedroom wall.

Another interesting quality you see between the flashbacks and present time is that when there is a flashback the lighting. When we see William and Edward in present day the setting often looks normal with natural looking lighting and everything seems to be in focus. With the flashbacks we see that the lighting looks more staged and setting starts to become more unrealistic. All the lighting in the flashbacks are exaggerated. When you see a flashback that has a darker mood the lighting is incredibly dark and gloomy or in contrast when the flashback is a positive we see things much brighter. The lighting in the flashbacks also give the scene a hazy look to them, almost as if their hinting toward the fact that they may not be real. When we see someone important in the flashbacks they become even more bright almost to the point that they look like they are glowing. If we look at the backgrounds in the flashbacks they are also not in focus or they are not well defined.

we’ve looked at how lighting helps set the mood but, now lets looking at the difference in settings. When we see scenes from present day everything looks “normal”. When we look at the settings in the flashbacks we see that there are parts of them that just don’t look realistic. There are scenes where there are small parts that look to be animated and make the rest of the setting seem unnatural. When we see something scary in a flashback there is a lot of ominous fog that randomly appears and the scene becomes dark. Again this could be hinting toward the fact that whatever we are looking at could be fictional. There is a particular scene where we are shown this small town where all of the houses seem similar, all the yards look the same, and they all have men mowing the lawn. All of the symmetry  makes it seem like a fake town because in real life you wouldn’t see that.

the narration and music in a film can have a huge impact on the viewer. The narration in Big Fish switches between Edward’s and William’s point of views. The narrations are both told from first person narration point of view giving the viewer valuable information that the viewer would not know otherwise. When we are watching scenes that are supposed to be from Edward’s life we hear Edward as the narrator but, when we hear present day narration it is in William’s voice. It makes it feel almost as if what Edward is saying is fictional because everything is told in this fantastical way to match the stories he tells about his life. When William is narrating it sounds normal and uneventful, matching how he feels that the stories his father is telling are not true . When we hear a narrators voice it often drowns out all the other noise coming from the scene to draw your attention to the sound rather than the action that is happening in the scene. The music in all of the flashbacks once again make them seem unrealistic or fake. When we see Edward do something heroic or action packed we hear this cartoon hero type music. This also happens when something scary or suspenseful happens its not necessarily scary music it sounds almost cartoon scary.

Edwards Wife shown in different scenes

Mise en scene is also plays a big part of making Big Fish a successful movie.In Big Fish the lighting helps set the tone of the movie in different situations. Lighting in the scenes becomes dark and creates tension and when the tension breaks the scene becomes lighter. Mis en scene involves make up and costume of characters. One of the very obvious examples of use of make up and costume use is when Edwards wife is shown in scenes. She is portraied as feminine and has a happy attitude so she always has on light colors and obvious make up. A great example of costume use is when you see circus people they are wearing bright colorful clothing to project their vibrant personalities.

sources cited:

Barsam, Richard, and Dave Monahan. Looking at movies. 5th ed. New York: W. W. Norton, 2015. Print.

Fanpop, Inc. “Big Fish Fan Art: Sandra and Edward <3.” (24883954). N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Feb. 2017.

Finney, Albert, and Billy Crudup, Actor. Big Fish . Directed by Tim Burton2003.

“Lindsey’s Lists: Characters with enviable wardrobes (Part II).” The Motion Pictures. N.p., 30 Apr. 2012. Web. 04 Feb. 2017.

Videographer, Utah. “FILM REVIEW | BIG FISH.” Blog. , edited by Utah Videographer, www.nathanpickettfilms.com/blog/film-review/big-fish/. Accessed 19 Jan. 2015.