Summary Essay: Finding Nemo This undersea movie is introduced with a married couple of clownfish admiring their new home by the drop off. While talking about their future plans and getting ready for their clutch of eggs to hatch, a barracuda attacks them, leaving Marlin, the husband, unconscious, a widower, and a father of one fish, Nemo. The movie then transitions to years later on Nemo’s first day of school.
While ecstatic to meet his classmates, teacher, and the independence of going to school, Marlin ceases to let Nemo go smoothly due to his fear of losing his only son and the worry of his “lucky” fin (an injury acquired from the barracuda attack). After such trauma, Marlin is known to be “scared” of the ocean, filled with anxiety, and “not-so-funny for a clownfish”. These particular traits are truly vibrant when he goes after Nemo’s class to the drop off and begins to yell at his son.
After much embarrassment from his father reprimanding him at the drop off, Nemo decides to “touch the butt” and was consequently taken by divers on a mysterious boat. The only evidence left behind was that of a scuba mask, which fell into the water and sank down to the deep blue sea. While frantically looking for his son and any sign of the boat, Marlin encounters a strange, naive, but optimistic blue fish, Dory, who admits she knows where the boat went. Unfortunately, it did not take long for Marlin to realize she suffered from short-term memory loss.
Marlin’s great adventures begin while meeting three sharks on a fish-free diet that declare, “Fish are friends, not food”. While pledging and attending their “party”, Marlin sees the mask that fell off the boat and begins to argue with Dory about the address. Their fight ends with the mask snapping Dory’s nose and giving her a nosebleed, which causes Bruce to lose control and go into attack mode. Meanwhile, Nemo’s captor places him into a fish tank in his office in Sydney, Australia.
There, Nemo meets a group of aquarium fish called the “Tank Gang”. The fish are frightened to learn that the dentist plans to give Nemo to his niece, Darla, who is known for killing a goldfish, named Chuckles, by constantly shaking the bag he was in. In order to avoid the situation, Gill, the leader of the “Tank Gang”, who is also from the ocean, gives Nemo a role in an escape plan, which involves jamming the tank’s filter and forcing the dentist to remove the fish from the tank to clean it manually.
While Nemo is being initiated into the group and being told the next escape plan, Dory and Marlin “just keep swimming” into a dark trench where the mask fell. There they struggle to both, read the address on the mask and survive death from a vicious anglerfish. Thankfully the fish were able to accomplish both and began their adventure to Sydney. Shortly after Marlin and Dory accidentally run into a bloom of jellyfish that nearly stings them to death; they wake up to see Crush, a surfer turtle, which takes Dory and him on the East Australian Current.
In the current, Marlin shares the details of his journey with a group of turtles and his story spreads rapidly across the ocean and eventually reaches Nemo in Sydney. When Dory and Marlin get to Sydney, Nigel, a pelican who happens to be friends with Nemo and the Tank Gang, recognizes Marlin from the stories he has heard and rescues the two fish from a flock of hungry seagulls. By this time, Darla gets to the dentist ready to “shake up” her next fish. As a last result Nemo plays dead hoping to get flushed out to the ocean.
However, Marlin, not knowing that his son is actually alive, gets the vision of death, and sadly loses hope and beings to swim home depressed. As Marlin continues to leave, Dory gets left behind, confused and lost, but somehow she encounters Nemo who just escaped into the ocean from a drainpipe. Dory’s memory is suddenly restored after she reads the word “Sydney” on a nearby drainpipe and, remembering her journey, she guides Nemo to Marlin. After the two joyfully reunite, Dory is caught in a fishing net with a bunch of other fish.
Nemo enters the net with bravery and directs the group to swim downward to break the net, reminiscent of a similar scenario that occurred in the fish tank earlier in the film. The fish, including Dory, succeed in breaking the net and escape. Following the grand adventure, escape, and rescue, the movie ends with Nemo going to school again and Marlin is no longer over protective or doubtful of his son’s potential and ability. He and the other parents gladly watch their kids leave and to end the scene Marlin tells a funny joke to fully present his transformation.
