What do we think of Catfish?

I think this is the best documentary about Facebook and meeting people online. At least until The Social Network opens.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BuE98oeL-e0



• Actually the surprise twist ending is that there is no surprise twist ending. Everything progressed to its natural end. There were no surprises at all. Everything is basically set up and revealed in the first quarter of the movie. What a completely genius but completely misleading marketing campaign.

• After the movie everyone in the theater were talking about how it was not the movie they expected. They were expecting a thriller or a scary movie. They all thought they were coming to see Paranormal Activity 2. Even the commercials were saying this was an Alfred Hitchcock suspense thriller. It was not. It was not a bad movie, just misrepresented.

• There are serious doubts as to whether this is a documentary. At the very least, there are suspicions that many of the initial scenes were recreated and filmed specifically for the purpose of the movie.

• Overrated.

  Jim Palmer

• Catfish scare me. A big one could swallow you whole.

• R3, are stupid? Of course it''s not a real documentary. Just like Paranormal Activity was not a real documentary. They''re all actors.

• R6, the creators get extremely defensive and pissed off when anyone suggests this is not a documentary. This is not some marketing ploy a la "Blair Witch" -- the creators are genuinely speaking about this movie as a real-life event they caught on film.\ \ No, I''m not stupid. At least not stupid enough to realize your post is missing the word "you" after "are" and before "stupid".

  R3

• If you thought Blair Witch was innovative, thought provoking, and well made, you'll love Catfish. The problem with the film isn't its underwhelming and predictable ending, it's that it presents itself as a documentary when it's fairly obvious that is only partially true. In one scene, they bring in a hidden camera. Then we see the ensuing scene not only from the viewpoint of the hidden camera, but additional angles as well. How'd that happen? But more substantially, it's fairly obvious that they knew before the last 40 filmed minutes what the end would be, and at that point, they ceased to merely be people in a documentary and became actors. They're pretending to solve a mystery they've already solved, not actually solving it; they become actors only pretending to do so. Then you start thinking back to the scenes you saw at the beginning of the film... *spoiler alert* *no really, don't read further if you don't want insight into the ending* What's happened in this film is usually not filmed and put in theaters - we usually see this stuff on Oprah in a poignant segment before the next guest, with the same story but from a different angle, is brought on. Or in more tragic cases, on the nightly news. This one didn't merit Nancy Grace or the News at 11:00, however, and should have been handed over to Oprah.

• In the trailer, they claim, "The last 40 minutes will take you on an EMOTIONAL ROLLERCOASTER RIDE that you WON''T BE ABLE TO SHAKE FOR DAYS!!!"

• R9, and they''re RIGHT!

• All you need to know, R9, is that quote is from JoBlo.com I wouldn''t put much stock into it.

• [quote]No, I''m not stupid. At least not stupid enough to realize your post is missing the word "you" after "are" and before "stupid".\ \ There is no word missing there. Do try to keep up with current slang and the way people talk. I''m so glad you "realized" this and proved your stupidity even more.

• R12 are stupid...really, really stupid.

• I love you, R13.

• Oh, Christ, what adult with a brain in his/her head gives a shit about Facebook? Grow up!

• I only like it fried.

• Never cares for catfish. It is the Spam of fish.

• I think it may have started as a documentary but it I doubt its all true.

• I prefer the four four review.

• R3 is misled, and R6 and R8 are amusingly self-confident and self-righteous about their utterly wrong assumptions. I know some of the people who made this movie. Whether you like it or not, it really is a documentary. The only stuff that was shot out of sequence was some of the Facebook screen shots, for more clarity.

• bump

• Catfish make my "nature" rise.

  Jimbo

• If you fry it up and serve it with hushpuppies and a big ol'' glass of iced tea, it''s good eatin''.

• Fried and must have good tartar sauce.

• There would have been no movie and no point to the movie if the main guy character hadn''t been really cute.

• I saw this last night and really liked it. I had no idea what to expect so I really enjoyed the way it unfolded. I have some questions. I felt they knew what they were dealing with then decided to film it or it was a complete set up of a very lonely sad woman. How did they film her during the reveal, at some point did they say, oh by the way, we are going to film the revelation of this fantasy you created? Either way or it was well done and pretty fascinating.

• It''s not a documentary, you moron. It''s a poorly written, directed, and acted work of fiction and they knew the only way it would get picked up on the fest circuit is if they claimed it was real. It''s not.

  Did you know the word gullible is not in the dictionary, OP?

• I watched it last night and thought it was a good movie. It turned out differently to how I thought it was going to end. I found it very creepy in parts. The ending was a bit of a disappointment, but all in all it was enjoyable.

• I thought the "filmmakers" were a couple of arrogant douchebags.\ \ They spent most of the movie mocking a very lonely, possibly mentally ill person.\ \ Assholes.

• The movie asked us to believe that a young photographer who seemed to spend most of his time on the Internet would be contacted by a 9-year-old child painting prodigy and would communicate with her for 8 months before thinking to actually Google the kid and learn more about her.\ \ Come on. You get a painting in the mail, totally out of the blue, of one of your photographs, painted by someone who claims to be a 9-year-old girl? The first thing you''d do would be to go on the Internet to learn more about her.\ \ I liked the way the story was told with the Google maps and the Facebook updates, but the plot was ridiculous and the filmmakers just seemed like stereotypes of self-centered millennials.

• [quote]It''s not a documentary, you moron. It''s a poorly written, directed, and acted work of fiction and they knew the only way it would get picked up on the fest circuit is if they claimed it was real. It''s not.\ \ So you''re saying that lady was an actress? And her disabled sons were too? Why wasn''t she nominated for an Oscar instead of Natalie Portman?

• bump

• Those twins broke my heart.

• What a strange movie, documentary, whatever it was.

• Um, didn''t anyone notice this was almost identical to "The Night Listener"? Maupin and his porn-boy should sue.

• I think Nev is really gay, and he''s just playing str8 in the movie.

• r29, got it right. Whether or not it was a real documentary - which the thread convinces me it was not - it superciliously mocks a very disturbed woman''s very pathetic life. Hated it.

• Don''t feel sorry for her. The film probably got a painting of hers sold and she acted like she had waited her whole for someone to point a camera at her...

• Agreed about gay Nev.%0D\ %0D\ I can''t believe anyone would think this is a real documentary. BULLshit. How stupid. And it isn''t even well-acted.

• I just saw this movie over the weekend. Yes, I'm on the late show, but I see many movies months or years after they hoopla about them dies off. Anyway, I knew very little about the story before watching it, but I remember having heard some reviews/reports about it being an interesting movie when it was released - and I'm sure I had the idea that is was a documentary. It was pretty apparent to me shortly after it started that even though it was being presented as a documentary, the scenes were being acted. I finished watching the whole thing before I went online to see whether I was correct in my feeling that it was a faked documentary. There was nothing that I could find to confirm it's validity. My question is, have the filmmakers ever fessed up to the story being manufactured? Or maybe the story was true, or partially true, but the filmed scenes were reenacted?

• It doesn't matter if they fessed up because based on Catfish, they got to write and direct their next documentary Paranormal Activity 3. The douchebag filmmakers are millionaires now since PA3 broke all sorts of records and is very very very profitable.

• Yeah, I don't think they were faking their douchiness.

• Someone lied about their Internet profile! Shocking! Sent from my iPad

  %21

• R40, no, the filmmakers never "fessed up" to it being manufactured, and in fact still insist to this day that it was filmed as a documentary, as R20 said. FWIW, when I first watched it a while ago, I did quite a lot of reading on the internet, researching both points of view, and ended up concluding it was mainly shot as the documentary it presented itself to be. Some things were tweaked to produce the final product - and make some things clearer - but it wasn't "fake real" in the same way as "Blair Witch", for e.g.

• Those dudes were such tools. I was hoping the mom would hatchet murder them both.

• Has anyone been watching the TV series based on it on MTV? It's pretty good. The reveal at the end of the first episode was really shocking. Max, the cameraman, is pretty hot, too.

• Honestly I am surprised that people fall for images(#NoOtherProof). They think they fall in love that will last forever without actually knowing them. Yeah I was shocked, I thought it was going to be a younger boy.

• My feeling was that it actually happened and that in editing they re-created moments or decided to maybe reshoot moments. That's why a few moments rang so staged and phony to me. But I don't think it's fake or fictional.

• I agree with r48

• That's what I thought too, R47, when I heard her voice at the end of the teaser. I thought it was going to be a 12-year-old boy who conned an older girl into thinking she was this hot guy in his twenties. I get an icky feeling while watching the show that they're exploiting these people, especially since the host seems like such a smug, smarmy instigator...kind of a hipster version of the host from Cheaters. But it's like a trainwreck in that I can't look away.

• [quote]Has anyone been watching the TV series based on it on MTV? It's pretty good. The reveal at the end of the first episode was really shocking. Never heard of it, but it sounds interesting. Is it also called Catfish?

• Yeah, R51. Catfish: The Series. It's on Mondays at 11.

• If you want to see a better documentary about liars on the internet watch Talhotblond. It's really fascinating (and based on a documented case - not made up)

• I'm really loving this show, but I called last night's resolution from a mile away.

• I flipped on Catfish when nev was laying shirtless in bed. I wanna get lost for days in his pelt!

• Did anyone see last night's episode?

• I thought there was just one documentary, which I liked...although it was kind of embarrassing.

• Yeah, R56. It was good, but very sad. I don't think it was his weight so much as his wishy-washy attitude beforehand that sabotaged things with that girl. But you can tell that he's going to blame it on that, and pretend like she's shallow, and take all the culpability off him. Still, she did look a little disappointed when she saw him in life. Next week looks awesome though.

• He's cute, R55, but I have a serious crush on Max.

• I felt sorry for the fat guy in last night's episode. Nice to know he is losing weight and getting healthy.

• I love the show and movie. So, is Nev gay or staight? I get a gay vibe from his partner with the camera.

• Nev sucks cock. So does Max, his cameraman.

• Oh, my!

• Too hairy to be gay -- a gay man with an MTV show would have waxed or trimmed his chest.

• I really like it but I am as gullible as Gomer Pyle.

• One good point made about the film is - why obsessively film everything from the very beginning when there was no hint that anything was amiss at first?

• Number one - the girl last night was DUMB to expect her prince Charming in someone who wouldn't meet her for 10 years. These people get deluded by "love". It's also amazing how they have these long, intense chats on the computer, declaring love and making plans, but when they meet face-to-face, they can barely string words together.

• My coworker's daughter has been in a "relationship" for 7 years with a guy she met online from Australia. She got a temporary work visa and flew to meet him and he never showed, but sent his sister. My coworker claims her daughter has chatted with him on SKYPE, and believes it was him, but who knows. This poor girl won't date anyone else because of him and is wasting her 20s on this person.

• R68 - What was the reason the 'sister' gave as to why the brother couldn't show up? And this dummy still hangs on to this "we're soul mates" garbage. Sheesh.

• Max is so hot.

• He was my favorite character on Amos and Andy!

  Steve%20and%20Butterfly%20McQueen

• I'm hoping Max films his and Nev's nightly lovemaking and that someday we'll see "Cockfist: The Movie."

• Nev and Max have to be banging each other. They argue like gays in at least a 3-year relationship.

• Eww, Max is so old.

• Anyone with personal dish on Nev and Max? Are either gay?

• Max has a girlfriend from South America.

  Nev's Tramp Stamp

• Max is 30. Cute. And straight. ):

  https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn1/552323_396654880405455_1775807501_n.jpg%3Fdl%3D1

• 30 is not so old. Not even to 17 yer olds. I should know.

• R68, more details please! Her daughter must have been upset. Did she stay in Australia? Come home? And yeah, I wonder if she actually skyped with him, irbid she just told people she did... Perhaps she actually fell in lie with the sister. Hmmmmm. Now that story would be a great episode.

• He was a terrific pitcher.

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catfish_Hunter

• I think he's more of a catcher.

• Can someone start a thread about DLers who've been "Catfished" in real life? I can't start threads

• Another great episode tonight. This show is so exploitative, but I'm addicted. I felt really bad for the guy...he's the first one who seemed genuinely heartbroken. I think the fact that he kept talking to the girl afterwards meant he was really lonely and maybe a little dim. You could also tell that he may have been the first one that Nev and Max had some sympathy for, and felt bad for setting up.

• No comments on the crazy ghetto episode from last week? Mhissy was a cunt

• That was one scary episode, R84. The girl playing the prank was one of the clearest examples of a sociopath ever shown on reality TV. The crocodile tears during the sit-down with Nev and Max was repulsive.

• R84-That bitch Mhissy was crazy ! Two years of of pretending to be a man and a woman. All cause you don't like someone who dated your boyfriend who's using you!

• R84-Forget to say Mhissy was a hot ghetto mess pressed right outta City Trendz.

• bump

• Mhissy is the new Khia.

• I vote Mhissy for new datalounge icon

• I pronounce it 'Ma-Hiss!-y', R90.

• Yesterday's episode featured a bi girl and a FTM trans

• It just amazes me how all these ugly trashy people from Bumblefuck, Nowhere believe that they are loved by gorgeous people with amazing lives in exciting places. Does nobody have self-awareness anymore?

• Why the fuck does Max keep filming random shit when there is a full MTV crew shooting the entire show? It's very distracting and makes no sense.

• Mhissy was sick, and I can't believe that gave custody of her niece to her. I also will never understand why they all think models want to date them. Other than the stripper in DC, there is no way any of these people would get a date with anyone above a 4 of the hot scale.

• "Mhissy was sick, and I can't believe that gave custody of her niece to her." I wonder if she was lying about getting custody of her niece...

• BUMP!!