As we English students now know, Big Fish has many examples of archetypes and symbols that are used to put a theme together. Some of these archetypes are the witch, mermaid, giant, werewolf, circus, Spectre, and the list goes on. These archetypes are what the father, Edward, uses to compose a story of his "history", which leads to the frustration of his son, Will. However, although the main focus of watching the movie was to analyze the archetypes, I think the message the movie had to offer through these archetypes was just as important, if not, more so. A prevailing theme of the movie is that we are all made up of our "stories", and the "real" self that we see everyday may not be our truest one. Each one of those archetypes that we analyzed all had a significant meaning in Edward's life, and the importance he gave to those things is what made him who he was. Each person likes and gives importance to different things, and that is what makes up each persons core or soul. What we show people everyday is very different from the person we all are inside, and these stories are a way of symbolically expressing that inner core and getting people to know what the human soul is made up of. Perhaps the existence of symbols and archetypes came by the want to be able to show people what we feel instead of explaining it or to express what we feel without using formal definitions. Regardless, maybe it's not the study of the archetypes themselves that's as important, but rather what they mean instead.
-Daniel Hawkins
I felt that this is an excellent post about the deeper and significant meaning of what the film Big Fish actually means. I too felt that the film Big Fish was an excellent example of how stories are such an important part of our life. Also i feel that Mr. Hawkins brought up an ecellent point of how our "real" self may not always be our truest self.
ReplyDeletethe central archetype of the film is the "father-son-conflict". In the film we see a Will Bloom trying to connect to his father, Edward, before he passes away. Will claims to never have been close to his father because of his outlandish stories. Then after Will's wedding in the beginning of the film Will and Edward stop speaking and grow even farther apart. The events of the story get put into place when Will finds out that his father is dying and so he comes home to see him. The "Father-Son Conflict" archetype usually results when a father and son become divided over something. In the case of"Big Fish" it's Edward stories, that he uses to hide himself from his son, who upon reaching adulthood starts to see the truth. Then later when the father-son meet again and the son is man while the father is older, their relationship is strained; exactly the exactly the case in "Big Fish". When speaking of their relationship Will says "I didn't see anything of myself in my father, and I don't think he saw anything of himself in me. We were like strangers who knew each other very well." Their time spent apart enlarge the rift between them. This archetype resonates with the audience to great a much greater meaning in the film. This is just a slight variation on an archetype we're all familiar with since we all have fathers.
ReplyDelete- Marian J