"Catfish" is film that has been directed by new directors on the block Ariel Schulman and Henry Joost, and shows the story of one of their friends and brother of Ariel Yaniv Schulman, who is known as Nev in the film (as shown from left to right respectively in the picture below).
The film follows the story of Yaniv and his virtual relationship with a little girl, whom before the filming began sending Yaniv paintings of his published photography in the post. Overtime Yaniv becomes friends with the little girl and her entire family on Facebook and begins frequently contacting them through (obviously) Facebook, letters and even via phone; but is everything as it seems? Yaniv’s relationship with the family starts off as a friendly correspondence, before taking a world of twists and turns that will change the relationship between them forever.
"Catfish" itself was released not so long after the critically acclaimed film also featuring Facebook “The Social Network” hit our movie screens, and was properly released around this time in order to gain more viewers following the film's success (although the events in the film are said to have occurred in 2007). Following the same style as films such as "The Blair Witch Project" and "Cloverfield" the film is filmed using hand held cameras in order to create a documentary feel.
I myself held about this film when I attended a YSC film choosing meeting (a society that I am a member of at university) and became intrigued in it when one of my fellow members described the shocking revelations that were shown in the film and the fact that, despite the rumours surrounding this film, they believed the whole film to be true. Although "Catfish" was not chosen in the end to be shown at YSC, I could not get the film out of my head and one day found myself looking at a trailer of the film on YouTube (which is shown below).
After seeing this trailer I was drawn even more to watch the film, and within in a few minutes (sorry film industries) found it online and watched it straight away late one night by myself on my laptop. From the start I had an inkling where the story was going to in terms of shocks and twists, as everyone has held about similar stories in which people are not always what they seem over the Internet. Yaniv saying “She must be pretty awesome, at least from Facebook” to the camera whilst being filmed pretty much sums up the premonition that many viewers will definitely obtain about the film’s plot whilst watching it unfold. Despite this I would be completely thrown away by the truth that would become revealed in the last 40 minutes (as the trailer itself says), and would come away afterwards thinking “Holy S**t!"
Was the film however a new Alfred Hitchcock film that he never directed and did it live up to its hype? Firstly the film was in my mind nothing like an Alfred Hitchcock film. I still find it hard to comprehend how someone could think they were on a par! The trailer in general I believe is effective in drawing in your interest, but wrongly gives the impression that the film is a horror thriller and therefore is slightly misleading, (I expected a Scream like figure to explode through the garage door in the trailer and kill Yaniv with a pitchfork)! Secondly the film did to me live up to its hype and was indeed as shocking and mind blowing as people had claimed, but was not ground breaking or unique.
I am not sure whether I think this film is real or not as there are certain events that occur that I can’t believe would happen, were too coincidental and were down right too shocking to believe. Nevertheless "Catfish" is a film I would definitely recommend seeing, as I enjoyed watching it and I believe it importantly reinforces the issue in taking caution when meeting people over the Internet.
That’s it for now folks xD
Stay happy (and interweb safe)
Cheeky Lamby
xxxx
