I thank God for the Catfish...

With school back in full swing again I found myself in a very common position. It is an action put forth only by myself, however it is one that I cannot help. Most of the time it will stay for only a few hours… but if I’m lucky enough it can last for a few days. It is the joy and stress of procrastination! So, with this lovely urge to delay absolutely all of my seven projects, I decided to watch movies and boy I’m glad I did.

I want to share with you today, a film that was brought to my attention by friend. This film is called Catfish. A very strange title I know… but trust me there is a meaning behind it. I have attached the trailer for you to view:

So as you can see, the main storyline of the film consists of Nev and his relationship with “the Facebook family”. Nev is a photographer who lives in New York City, and one day he received a painting of one of his photographs in the mail. The painting came from eight-year-old Abby in Ishpeming, Michigan. Nev continued to send Abby photos to paint and soon found himself intertwined within her virtual family. Through a series of events, Nev came to the conclusion that his “Facebook family” was not completely how he had perceived it to be. His friend Abby and mother Angela were indeed real people, however, they did not look the same and Abby was not a painter. Unfortunately, Abby’s mother Angela was the one doing all the paintings, and she was also the voice of the sixteen individuals from Nev’s so-called “Facebook family”, including Abby’s older sister Megan who Nev had a relationship with! Angela was able to construct an imaginary network of friends and family for Abby by stealing entire collections of user’s photos.

Social networking has become such a staple of today’s young society that Nev was able to have a relationship with a make-believe network of people for a total of nine months. Although many of us treat social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace as primary means of communication we have to remind ourselves that nothing compares to face time. We mustn’t dive too deep into the waters of uncertainty, or if we do lets hope they’re filled with Catfish.

Vince (Abby’s Father)

“They used to take cod from Alaska all the way to China and they used to keep them in vats in the ship. By the time the Codfish reached China the flesh was mush and tasteless. So, this guy came up with the idea that if you put the Cod in these big vats and put some Catfish in with them the Catfish would keep the Cod agile. There are those people who are Catfish in life, and they keep you on your toes, they keep you guessing, they keep you fresh, and I thank God for the catfish.”