“One of my favourite films”: the Tim Burton movie George Clooney called a “masterpiece”
When he’s not making people swoon in front of the camera, George Clooney is working hard behind it.
The Oscar-winning actor is also an accomplished director, having made nine feature films at the time of writing. He was even nominated for ‘Best Director’ for Good Night, and Good Luck. Not too shabby for someone who’s primarily an actor.
As well as directing many of his own movies, Clooney has also worked with the very best filmmakers on planet Earth. He is a favourite of both Steven Soderbergh and the Coen brothers, having appeared in several of their best movies. He made up practically half of the cast of Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity and is set to star in Noah Baumbach’s Jay Kelly, which is being touted as something of a career renaissance for the silver fox.
One director that he’s never worked with is Tim Burton. The closest this came to happening was when Clooney took over the role of Bruce Wayne in Batman & Returns, a film that shared some DNA with Burton’s Michael Keaton-fronted ‘Batman’ movies. Not that either of them would be that keen to own up to being involved in that film in any way. However, this hasn’t stopped Clooney from praising the English director, with one movie in particular standing out.
“One of my favorite films is Big Fish, which I think is a masterpiece,” he revealed in an interview with Variety. “I grew up in a family of storytellers, but Google has destroyed us, because you can fact-check everything… We’d always like the stories to be a little better than they were.”
Based on Daniel Wallace’s novel of the same name, Big Fish was released in 2003 with Burton at the helm. It tells the story of Edward Bloom, a man known for his habit of telling extraordinary stories. His habit of exaggeration has alienated his son Will (Billy Crudup), who feels as if he doesn’t know his own dad at all. Things come to a head when an elderly Edward – played stunningly by Albert Finney – is on his deathbed, forcing father and son to figure each other out before it’s too late.
As Clooney hinted, the heart of Big Fish is all about storytelling. Edward takes real pride in spinning a good tale – it lifts people’s spirits and adds a bit of colour to an otherwise dull life. As the film goes on, Will starts to realise there was more truth in his dad’s stories than he’d first given him credit for. It’s through the telling that those stories become larger than life. The film plays with the idea of truth and how we relate to it – and by the end, you’ll probably have a whole new respect for the people who know how to make the truth sound like magic.
Burton is often labelled a ‘one-trick pony’. Most of his most successful pieces follow a very strong formula, and he’s been incredibly successful as a result, but that doesn’t mean he can’t do something completely different and still make something wonderful. Big Fish is easily one of the most underrated films ever made. Hopefully, Clooney’s seal of approval will inspire you to give it a try.
