Big Fish (2003)

Big Fish rating: IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic

IMDb8/10· 476K votes

Rotten Tomatoes76%

Metacritic58%

TMDb7.757/10· 8K votes

With 76% on Rotten Tomatoes, backed by 8/10 on IMDb and 58/100 on Metacritic, critical reception of this film has been positive.

About Big Fish

Throughout his life Edward Bloom has always been a man of big appetites, enormous passions and tall tales. In his later years, he remains a huge mystery to his son, William. Now, to get to know the real man, Will begins piecing together a true picture of his father from flashbacks of his amazing adventures.

Cast of Big Fish

• 

  Ewan McGregor

  as Ed Bloom (young)

• 

  Albert Finney

  as Ed Bloom (senior)

• 

  Billy Crudup

  as Will Bloom

• 

  Jessica Lange

  as Sandra Bloom (senior)

• 

  Helena Bonham Carter

  as Jenny (young & senior) / The Witch

• 

  Alison Lohman

  as Sandra Bloom (young)

• 

  Robert Guillaume

  as Dr. Bennett (senior)

• 

  Marion Cotillard

  as Josephine

• 

  Matthew McGrory

  as Karl the Giant

• 

  David Denman

  as Don Price (age 18-22)

• 

  Missi Pyle

  as Mildred

• 

  Loudon Wainwright III

  as Beamen

Big Fish facts

Budget

$70M

Box office

$123.2M

Our take on Big Fish

Tim Burton's 2003 fantasy drama centers on Edward Bloom, a man of enormous appetites and taller tales, and his grown son William, who has never been able to separate his father's myths from the truth. As Edward nears the end of his life, Will tries to know the real man by piecing together the fantastical adventures his father always recounted. Burton weaves flashbacks of whimsical escapades into a tender story about storytelling itself, memory, and the space between a father and son. It rewards viewers open to unabashed sentiment and imaginative visuals over grounded realism, and lands most deeply for anyone who has wrestled with understanding a parent.