Finding Nemo: Film Analysis

Rebecca and Phillip Stein (2017) discuss monomyth, a hero’s journey, in their book “Anthropology of Religion, Magic, and Witchcraft.” In the text, they use the definition of a monomyth given by Joseph Campbell. Campbell defines it as when “A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man.” (Stein & Stein, 2017.) According to the text, a hero’s journey has three stages: the departure, the initiation, and the return. (Stein and Stein, 2017.) The Disney movie, The Lion King, is a monomyth movie about a young lion who abandons his role as king of the Pride lands and must come back to save his family and his land when danger ensues. Simba is the son of Mufasa, the current king, therefore he is the rightful heir to the throne. This is the common day world that Simba lives in. His uncle, Scar, is filled with hatred towards both Simba and Mufasa, because he believes he deserves to be king. He comes up with an elaborate plan to kill them both. He tricks Simba into thinking that his father has a surprise for him, and he instructs Simba to wait inside of a canyon while he fetches his Mufasa. Scar deliberately starts a stampede of wildebeests to try and kill Simba. Mufasa arrives to the canyon to witness Simba clinging for his life, on a lone shrub’s branch, as thousands of

The archetype of the Hero’s Journey holds a prevalent pattern in the works of “Initiation” by Sylvia Plath, “A & P” by John Updike, and “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker. These works all follow the 17 stages of Joseph Campbell’s Monomyth which are separated in three stages; separation, initiation, and return. The main characters have different characterizations; however, they all follow the basic structure of the Hero’s journey archetype. There are many similarities and differences between the stages that are shown through many context clues and literary devices in each work. The Hero’s Journey archetype expressed in these literary works follow a similar and direct narrative pattern.

In his book The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Joseph Campbell defines the key elements that he believes compose the journey of a hero. Campbell defines these steps as the “Heroic monomyth” which chronicles the specific events undertaken by a hero in their quest. Campbell’s monomyth appears not only in myths, but even in modern films. In the sci-fi film Donnie Darko, directed and written by Richard Kelly, a teenage boy named Donnie follows the same steps defined in Campbell’s monomyth as he becomes his hero self in order to save his family and the world from destruction. Throughout this journey Donnie struggles with his desire to remain on earth, and continue his life with his family and girlfriend. However,

Both being clown fish, Nemo and Marlin live in the ocean, in the anemone. Marlin is Nemo’s father who is viewed as being overprotective towards Nemo. Marlin portrays the characteristic of being overprotective because while Nemo was in the egg as a baby, one of his fins was damaged. Nemo, tired of his overprotective father decides that he wants to prove himself by swimming into the open ocean. However, things do not turn out very well and Nemo is captured by a scuba diver. Parenting instinct kick in, and Marlin immediately swims after the boat that is now carrying Nemo. Marlin eventually loses sight of the boat, however throughout the duration of the movie, he continues to look for his son Nemo. While on his journey to find Nemo, Marlin meets a blue tang fish named Dory, who suffers from sort term memory loss (Stanton & Unkrich,2003). With the help of Dory, they are able to eventually find Nemo (Stanton & Unkrich, 2003). Come

But to fully grasp an audience, with twelve to fifteen steps is a lot to explain. Joseph Campbell gisted the essential components of the mononmyth as a whole, “The standard path of the mythological hero is a magnification of the formula represented in the rights of a passage: separation—initiation—return” (23). In these simple steps Campbell identified the foundation of all monomyths. In separation, the hero ventures astray from their later “prosaic” life into a region of supernatural wonder (23).Initiation, overzealous figures/forces are encountered and a decisive victory is won (23).Lastly,the now master of the narrative returns from the surreptitious journey with bestowed power

The first stage of the monomyth is the departure. In this stage, the hero first receives “call to adventure,” either directly or sometimes unwittingly. In a real life example, this would be taking on a task, one that is assigned by someone else or one that is chosen by oneself. This could be an assignment at a job, or it could be the desire to pursue a new hobby. Campbell mentions the “refusal of the call,” or the turning away from the journey. In life, when taking on a task, it can seem too difficult or frightening, and the natural desire may be to turn away. Campbell warns that this “converts the adventure into its negative… [and] the subject loses the power of affirmative action and becomes a victim to be saved” (59). Though an adventure may be difficult, the hero will usually gain the assist of a supernatural aid. Many

We all know the popular family movie “Finding Nemo” a kid’s movie that tells a journey of Marlin, a father clown fish, who crosses the vast ocean to find his son Nemo. During Marlin’s journey he comes across many new and scary things, but like any good children’s movie Marlin does eventually find his son Nemo and they go back home and live happily ever after. This all sounds good right? Wrong! Looking at this movie from a psychologist point of view, or in my case a psychology students’ point of view you slowly begin to realize from the moment the movie starts each and every one of the characters in this lovely kids movie is kind of messed up in their own special way.

Part Three: At the beginning of the fishing trip the men were afraid to leave to the hospital because the hospital was their safe place. They were afraid that people would judge them and they were afraid of the "bad weather" Nurse Ratched told them about. The men had little confidence, especially when the men were taunting and making fun of them before they got on the boat. McMurphy usually does everything for them or tells them exactly how to do something, but this let the men branch out on figure things out for themselves. Towards the end of the fishing scene the men are fishing by themselves without McMurphy's help which shows how they gained confidence in themselves and shows how they can face public interactions. The fishing scene helped

Life is a precious gift, as you only get one chance to become your best self. In life everyone has hopes and dreams to find their calling to potentially make a difference in the world. In literature we are presented with an abundance of epic hero stories, referring to fictional or non-fictional characters that have made a difference in their world. These characters grant the reader with entertaining stories pertaining to historical or fictional events that reflect the hero’s journey to making a triumphant change. Joseph Campbell’s theory that every hero has a similar journey to becoming their best self commences with a call to an adventure. The call to adventure is the first and most important step in Joseph Campbell’s hero monomyth, “A hero with a Thousand Faces.”

On his pursuit he meets a blue fish named Dori, who has a memory problem. She undoubtedly is annoying to Marlin and he gets very impatient with her when she continues to repeat herself. Against his better judgment he agrees to let her help him find his lost son. For the next few days, as the movie goes, they have several encounters with other marine wildlife that according to Marlin are dangerous. First they encounter three sharks which are known to be solely meat eaters but they join the sharks and spend some time with them that show them that not all sharks are that way but some feel that fish should be thought of as "friends, not food" as the sharks like to say. With this knowledge he begins to trust more of the other sea creatures that he did before.

The “hero’s journey”, coined by Joseph Campbell, is a pattern in the plot structure of literature, myths, and oral tradition in which the hero is consistently faced with similar obstacles and achieves many of the same goals. The first part of the hero’s journey is “The Call.” The hero is usually living a very comfortable and easy life, unaware of the journey ahead. The hero is then faced with a situation or dilemma which eventually causes them to seek change. The hero, at this point, tends to refuse the call to adventure in fear of the unknown. Once the hero has been given the strength to push past the unknown, they have entered the threshold. The hero will experience many challenges and temptations where the hero is tested, eventually reaching “The Abyss,” the most difficult challenge. The hero is then transformed by these trials and returns home to every-day life and begins to contribute to their society. The novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, the protagonist, Janie, experiences the hero’s journey first-hand through overcoming obstacles and transforming herself. In Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, the heroine Janie overcomes many obstacles and is therefore transformed into a self reliant woman.

People living with PTSD go through a depressing, terrible experience that sparks threat, fear, and danger in their thoughts. This is experienced and shown by Marlin, in the Disney Pixar movie Finding Nemo, when he saw his wife and all five hundred of their eggs, except Nemo, get eaten by a barracuda in front of him. Marlin felt helpless beings he could not defend and keep his family from the cruel barracuda. Like in most people's occasions of posttraumatic stress disorder, Marlins experience of helplessness and fear lead him to be very overcautious with everything he does and how he lives his life and how he allows his son, Nemo, to live his life. As posttraumatic stress disorder leads to never ending panic and nerve-wracking worry, Marlin

In 1949, Joseph Campbell popularized his version of the monomyth, or the hero’s journey. In this version, there were seventeen stages which were split into three distinct categories including the Departure, the Initiation, and finally, the Return. Over the course of several years, there have been numerous versions of the hero’s journey; most of them derived from Joseph Campbell’s initial version. After watching “The Perks of Being a Wallflower”, I was able to categorize the events in the movie into Christopher Vogler’s version of the hero’s journey which consists of twelve stages. The twelve stages are 1. The ordinary world, 2. The call to adventure, 3. Refusal of the call, 4. Meeting the master, 5. Crossing the threshold, 6. Tests, allies, and enemies, 7. Approaching the dragon’s den, 8. The ordeal, 9. Seizing the treasure, 10. The road back, 11. Resurrection, and finally, 12. Return with the treasure. However, modern film tends to stray from the typical hero’s journey more than the usual traditional epic poem.

Although psychology class is most likely not the first thing to come to mind when watching a Disney movie, many psychological concepts can be drawn from them. In Andrew Stanton’s 2003 animated film, Finding Nemo, various psychological concepts are exemplified. Finding Nemo tells the story of an overly cautious clownfish named Marlin who losses his son, Nemo, to a pair of divers. He meets a fish named Dory who together seek to find Marlin’s son. Throughout their journey they encounter a storm of jelly fish, surfing sea-turtles, sharks participating in a “Fish are Friends, Not Food (Graham, 2003)” support group, and numerous other conflicts. Hidden between the lines of their comic misfortunes, Marlin suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder, many characters fall to acts of conformity, and altruism is a theme that defines the movie.

alone and forty more with Manolin. The great ordeal with the marlin lasts three days;