Movie Review: "Catfish The Movie"

This review is for the Movie "Catfish" be sure to check out my recaps for the TV show on MTV here http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474981835731 is one of them.

Ok I have to admit I first heard of this movie on the 20/20 special they had. I feel like I learned more with that than the movie itself. Everything on the movie was on the 20/20 special.

So, the film starts out with cutie Nev Schulman. He somehow (the film does not go into detail about anything) gets an email from 8 year old Abby who is a really great artist. Her artwork is so impressive that Nev's brother decides to start filming their interaction.

It's not as creepy as it sounds don't worry. Nev even decides to contact her mother Angela to make sure this is OK. Angela seems nice and all but it just doesn't add up. She says that Abby got over 6,000 for a painting. There is no way this is possible famous artists struggle for that much.

He then meets her whole family virtually via facebook. There is a bunch of them too including 24 year old Megan who happens to be Angela's daughter and is a beautiful, aspiring model.

Cue the attraction. Nev and Megan began an instant flirt mance where they talk on the phone and call each other babe. The movie does not show much of the romance at all it is very brief. I would of liked to see the relationship build more.

Now the "fishy" parts start to surface. Megan sends Nev a cover of a song which he youtubes and finds she copied. It's about time he searched for something about this girl. He then decides to go visit her in Michigan and sees the address she gave him, along with the address to Abby's art gallery are both fake.

Megan still continues to lie even though Nev knows something is up. He then tells his brother about the steamy phone conversations he had with Megan which is uncomfortable to say the least.

He then goes to Angela's house and suprise she is not the tall, thin super mom they had in their head. She has a husband Vince and he has two disabled sons from a previous marriage. That whole situation gives the audience sympathy for Angela and could see why she would want such escape.

Then on the way back to the hotel they come to terms with the truth: Angela has been posing as Megan this whole time (even though Megan is her daughter's real name they are not on speaking terms and she has no idea this Nev person is "in love with her"). Angela is in love with Nev and made up all these people.

They even find out Abby is not an artist but Angela is. The stuff hasn't been coming from an eight year old girl but an older housewife. Nev then gets a text from Megan with some story about her entering rehab for alcohol and he can't believe the lies are still going on.

The next day Nev (in a nice way) tells Angela he knows and she admits everything. She admits that all of her own hopes and dreams went away when she married Vince and she used "Megan" as an outlet for that. Vince seems really nice and thinks Nev is there for Angela's artwork. I wonder what he thinks now.

One of the final scenes is really tough to watch. Angela paints Nev's portrait and he asks her to talk to him as Megan which she does. He wants her to realize the torment she put him through and she does.

Nev then goes back to New York with a broken heart but remains friends with Angela.

My point of view- There are a lot of haters out there who can't believe this would happen. Well it took place years ago before skype and facetime where the norm. Nev just trusted someone why would he google her. This movie was not as "thrilling" as the previews said, no suspense or anything of that nature. I always knew what was going to happen.

The 20/20 special was so much better like I said before. It showed more from Angela's point of view and even showed where Nev met the girl in the pictures Angela used as Megan. No love story here though she is actually married (fun fact: Angela used her husband's picture as another character).

Overall score is 5 out of 10