"Der Fischer und seine Frau" or "The Fisherman and His Wife" is a German film from 2005, so this one is already over a decade old and the writer and director here is Doris Dörrie, one of Germany's most famous (female) filmmakers. It runs for a bit under 100 minutes as a whole and features several names in the cast that German film buffs will immediately recognize, such as the two actors playing the title characters, Christian Ulmen and Alexandra Maria Lara. But also Elmar Wepper and Simon Verhoeven will be familiar, even if the latter now mostly because of his work behind the camera. As for Dörrie, her fascination with Asia goes decades back and here we have another piece of evidence, even if this one is more about the culture clash between Germans and Asian culture and also Germans clashing with each other and not really with Asians or even Asian culture. Actually, this one here is much more about expensive Asian fish than Asian humans. Nonetheless I believe that most of the focus here is on the couple mentioned in the title. Maybe you have heard about this title already in another context as it is also the name of a famous tale and Dörrie clearly turned this film into a modern version of said tale. The parallels are undeniable.
I would say that this was a good watch overall in the first half. It is subtle and quietly convincing and the only aspect I found annoying were honestly the talking fish (one of them Heiner Lauterbach who worked with Dörrie before of course) as they seemed way too gimmicky for my taste. But sadly after the fifty-minute mark, the film heads into a direction that just didn't work for me at all and this includes the win of this special competition, the cheating with the formerly best friend and eventually the explanation that she did what she did only because he never said those three magical words and he also accepts this explanation. Needless to say the talking fish parts were still bad, even if they were less frequent, which is really the only good thing about the second half. The final frog transformation was definitely nothing to be proud of and it adds more absurdity. Shame they did not manage to keep the level from the beginning and turned this into a loud and boastful movie that traded depth for make-believe. It stopped feeling realistic then really quickly. As for Dörrie's Asia centered works, it's definitely nowhere near the bad level of her recent Fukushima film, but it also is way way below the high quality of "Enlightenment guaranteed". The latter has Gustav Peter Wöhler in the lead and he plays a small role in this 2005 film too and he sure did a lot with the little material he had to work with. I would have loved to find out more about his character and life as actually this character also would have deserved his own film from what we find out about him here. Anyway, it would have moved the action too far away from Ulmen and Lara, so I guess I can see why they kept Wöhler's character's story minimal, even if I find it a pity. As for the entire film we have here, I have to give it a thumbs-down I guess. Had it not declined so rapidly, then my thumb would certainly show into the opposite direction as I enjoyed what I saw early on. As for the product, however, I suggest you skip it and watch something else instead.
I would say that this was a good watch overall in the first half. It is subtle and quietly convincing and the only aspect I found annoying were honestly the talking fish (one of them Heiner Lauterbach who worked with Dörrie before of course) as they seemed way too gimmicky for my taste. But sadly after the fifty-minute mark, the film heads into a direction that just didn't work for me at all and this includes the win of this special competition, the cheating with the formerly best friend and eventually the explanation that she did what she did only because he never said those three magical words and he also accepts this explanation. Needless to say the talking fish parts were still bad, even if they were less frequent, which is really the only good thing about the second half. The final frog transformation was definitely nothing to be proud of and it adds more absurdity. Shame they did not manage to keep the level from the beginning and turned this into a loud and boastful movie that traded depth for make-believe. It stopped feeling realistic then really quickly. As for Dörrie's Asia centered works, it's definitely nowhere near the bad level of her recent Fukushima film, but it also is way way below the high quality of "Enlightenment guaranteed". The latter has Gustav Peter Wöhler in the lead and he plays a small role in this 2005 film too and he sure did a lot with the little material he had to work with. I would have loved to find out more about his character and life as actually this character also would have deserved his own film from what we find out about him here. Anyway, it would have moved the action too far away from Ulmen and Lara, so I guess I can see why they kept Wöhler's character's story minimal, even if I find it a pity. As for the entire film we have here, I have to give it a thumbs-down I guess. Had it not declined so rapidly, then my thumb would certainly show into the opposite direction as I enjoyed what I saw early on. As for the product, however, I suggest you skip it and watch something else instead.