Movies

The Fisherman is Animated, Abstract Sc-Fi about Energy Dependence. And Fish-Mating.

By  · Published on December 28th, 2016

Short of the Day

Imagine if Douglas Adams made anime, and you’re kinda in the ballpark.

An old mollusk-esque man conceives of some strange device that looks and moves like a fish.

Years later his daughter, now grown and living in the home by herself, mourns the loss of her father. The only living reminder she has of him, besides herself, is a little green fish in a large clear tank, a part of his life’s work that he has passed on to her.

Meanwhile in a Neo-Tokyo-like city whose eco-system is dependent upon electricity for life, a human engineer living alone responds to a downed display and finds another fish – the missing link of the old mollusk’s work – in the fuse box, a hook in its mouth. He removes the hook and sets the fish free.

Back in the country, the little green fish senses this and breaks free of its containment. It swims on currents of air to the city where it collides with the freed fish, thus initiating a bizarre mating ritual that results in a natural takeover of the modern world.

Sounds nuts, right? I didn’t even tell you yet that it’s animated in a basic but bombastic style, bright and odd and surreally scored with ambient sound, a synthy soundtrack, and no dialog whatsoever.

This is The Fisherman, a short film written, directed and animated by Luke Saunders that premiered on DUST earlier this month, and as strangely wonderful as I’ve made it sound, it really must be experienced to be fully appreciated. Sci-Fi of the silent and strangest kind, The Fisherman is interpretive, it isn’t complete until you see it, process it, and add your own personal meaning to the moral lexicon in which it speaks. It’s also beautiful, sweetly haunting, and visually dynamic. Put all this together and you have a short that begs to be seen.

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