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Finding Dory (A PopEntertainment.com Movie Review)

Updated: Mar 25, 2020


Finding Dory

Finding Dory


FINDING DORY (2016)


Featuring the voices of Ellen DeGeneres, Albert Brooks, Ed O’Neill, Kaitlin Olson, Hayden Rolence, Ty Burrell, Diane Keaton, Eugene Levy, Sloane Murray, Idris Elba, Dominic West, Bob Peterson, Kate McKinnon, Bill Hader, Sigourney Weaver, John Ratzenberger, Willem Dafoe, Allison Janney, Brad Garrett, Austin Pendleton, Vicki Lewis and Stephen Root.


Screenplay by Andrew Stanton.


Directed by Andrew Stanton.


Distributed by Walt Disney Pictures.  103 minutes.  Rated PG.


Finding Dory does not really break much new ground from its predecessor, the beloved 2003 animated film Finding Nemo.  However, as a continuation of that earlier film, with slight variations in plot still sort of echoing the first, and a new dollop of sentimental pathos, Finding Dory is still a very satisfying film.


Basically Finding Dory flips the equation on the story, going from a movie about a parent crossing the seas searching for his child to a movie about a child crossing the seas searching for her parents.


It is sweet, it is charming, it is colorful, but it’s nothing we haven’t seen before.


The main difference between Nemo and Dory is, obviously, the fish who is lost.  Dory was a supporting character in Finding Nemo – though granted the breakthrough supporting character – a blue tang with a serious bout of short-term memory loss.


Due to her constantly rebooting memory, Dory is unable to remember anything that happened more than moments ago.  Still, she has settled into a comfortable life with her friends Marlin and Nemo and all their neighbors.


She is mostly very happy and loved.  However, she always has this gnawing feeling that something is missing from her life, and she can’t quite remember what it is.


Suddenly a memory is sparked in her synapses, from when she was just a baby fish, of her father and mother trying to teach her how to deal with her memory problem.  They also show her some tricks to find them if she gets lost.


Dory knows that she desperately wants to find her family, and yet she also knows that she has no clue where they are.  Marlin and Nemo tag along to help her, but also to be sure that she doesn’t get lost and never find her way back home again.


Pretty much like the original film, it is almost a complete coincidence that she actually finds her own home.  The same giant tortoise who gave them a ride across the sea in the first film just drops them off in a random area by a water park and suddenly – wait, this looks familiar…


It’s a terrifically amusing film, but it feels just like the last one.  Still, it is worth the time and effort, not just for kids but parents, too.


Jay S. Jacobs


Copyright ©2016 PopEntertainment.com. All rights reserved. Posted: June 14, 2016.

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