Fish Story

Yoshihiro Nakamura's 2009 comedy is set in the year 2012, approximately five hours before a comet is due to collide with Earth. While most of Tokyo has fled for safety, a few individuals wind up in a record store where the long-forgotten punk music song “Fish Story” is being played on a turntable. The store's owner insists that the song will save the world, although the tune's strange lyrics and a section of complete silence only seem to add to the general confusion. Fish Story then takes a trippy time-traveling spin, showing how the playing of this particular song in 1982, 1999, and 2009 resulted in astonishing changes for those fortunate enough to hear it. Along the way, we also witness a 1975 sequence on the punk band that recorded the song, only to break up shortly after toiling in obscurity—just before the Sex Pistols put punk on the music map. With its exaggerated style and tongue-in-cheek silliness, Fish Story often feels like a (pardon the expression) big fish tale, but while the loose narrative structure may seem initially baffling, all is ultimately tied up in a satisfying manner. Recommended. (P. Hall)