MovieChat Forums > Dolphin Tale (2011) Discussion > A fish?

A fish?

posted 13 years ago by scarrett1031
31 replies | jump to latest

Why is Morgan Freeman calling the dophin a "fish"? Morgan is one of the best and smartest actors I have ever seen, but this pulls him off to be ignorant...according to the commercials, anyway. I hope he is using that as a joke...he seems to be a very smart doctor...vet, maybe?

(For anyone reading this and don't understand, dolphins are mammals. They have lungs, breath air, and their tails are horizontal...completely different from the vertical tails on fish. These were some of the things I didn't know of when I was very young, and even learned more when I volunteered at our amusement park with our dolphins and sea lions)

Has anyone seen the movie yet to explain why he was doing that?

(I want to let everyone know that my mistake was that I should have truly made it obvious that it was Morgan's character who was making the "fish" comments. when I said "this pulls HIM off, I actually meant his character...sorry)

[–] number1212 13 years ago

I haven't seen any of the commercials that you are refering to, but I am guess that it is a joke.

[–] scarrett1031 13 years ago

I hope you are right...lol. Hopefully they keep trying to convince him, but maybe he's just messin' with them...lol...oh well, now I have to see the movie to find out.

[–] white-37 13 years ago

must be the character he's playing.

[–] penmark71 13 years ago

Actually, it's not Morgan Freeman calling Winter a fish, it's his character "Dr. McCarthy" calling Winter a fish. And I'm sure that it's not the first time that a dolphin has been called a fish.

[–] proudbrunette 12 years ago

That's what I was thinking. Dr. McCarthy had only ever treated humans up until then so maybe he didn't know the difference.

[–] mr-person-1 13 years ago

Come on mammal... SWIM!!!

just isn't the same

[–] AnotherRandomGuy 13 years ago

His character is pretty wacky.

[–] lb-36 13 years ago

I can't believe some people don't realize the character of McCarthy is joking! Wow. He also says America's greatest invention is the chili burger, he says one prosthetic tail was made from parts off an old Buick. he says all kinds of crazy jokey things in the movie, it's his personality.. he says he's going to wear the tail himself at one point, but he's KIDDING. of course he knows they're mammals...

[–] AnotherRandomGuy 13 years ago

I figured "wacky" encompassed this detail, that he was joking. He was too smart not to know.

[–] scarrett1031 13 years ago

That's true...but I don't remember anyone elase calling the dolphin a mammal, which should be a very important thing to mention when there are so many children watching the movie. I don't mind that it was a joke...just that children may take it seriously.

I thought he was great in the movie, btw.

[–] NeoDeMover 13 years ago

I believe many of the reasons that Hollywood does this, is so that a character will explain it to another that THEY ARE NOT FISH. People are generally stupid, so its a quick educational statement.

People think monkeys and apes are the same, or that people come from monkeys, etc, etc

[–] lb-36 13 years ago

"People are generally stupid"??? Wow. What a sad commentary on Americans. I don't believe it, kids interested in animals all know that whales and dolphins are mammals. It appears this movie was giving the audience (and especially kids) credit for knowing something about dolphins, instead of treating them as stupid, which is refreshing...

[–] NeoDeMover 13 years ago

Uh... yeah, many Americans are STUPID. (And I'm a Texan)

Watch some of Jay leno's old jay-walkers (whatever) interviews in which he'll ask people basic question that EVERYONE should know.

They've (not just Leno) interviewed Americans and we get stupid answers like: China is NORTH of the USA (like where Canada is). Not knowing who George Washington is. Not knowing what causes ocean tides... stuff we learn in GRADE school.

Want proof? Look at the laws being made in the US of A in which IDIOTS wants creationism to be taught in our schools. Some of these morons believed that humans lived along side of dinosaurs.

[–] ColbertoReporto 13 years ago

Post of the year

T: @RaysPoet

[–] 13 years ago

[deleted]

[–] PenTheater 12 years ago

America has high schools where large numbers of the students are illiterate,
don't believe me? ask a few teachers.

but those young adults aren't going to be going to see movies like this, and I bet they don't care if Dolphins aren't fish.

[–] chelle_5399 13 years ago

I saw the movie and wondered myself why the character called Winter a fish.

[–] scarrett1031 13 years ago

I saw the movie yesterday, and also still wonder why. He may have just been trying to be funny, but I'm surprised that I don't remember ANY of the characters mentioning that she was a mammal. (might be wrong though...I had to take my nieces to the snack bar for a little while.)

I thought the movie was great, so did evryone I was with. I'll let that go...lol.

[–] Lightrend 13 years ago

Dolphins are mammals, sure. The intelligent way to say this is that since Dolphins have blowholes, they are whales, and WHALES are mammals.

This is the meat of the message, and people who know this understand that a shark is dangerous because it DOESN'T have critical thinking, while a Killer Whale (orca) is dangerous because it is one of the few animals out there that have a shot at outsmarting a human.

But my immediate reaction to your post is the following;

Isn't it kind of stupid to assume that people are ignorant because they don't know every single technicality of biology? A human actually has very little use of knowing the difference between fish and whales - most of us never interact with either of them. And if we're forced to battle a creature the size of a bus, we arm ourselves; a rocket launcher doesn't care if hits a mammal or a fish.

[–] scarrett1031 13 years ago

Go back and read my original post. I did not call him stupid (I know you didn't say that I did...just want everyone to realize this). I used the word ignorant intentionally because anyone who is intelligent can be ignorant of a subject until they learn about it. I know the difference. If I thought he was stupid it would show how stupid I would be, not understanding the definition differences between the two words.

I hope this helps you understand.

Also, I was very sure that he was most likely being a funny guy, as well as intelligent. But after seeing the movie, my main problem would be that I don't remember any other character saying that the dolphins are mammals. Maybe they did. If you know where in the movie that they did, I would completely appreciate that. I don't mind that he didn't know or that he was being funny (it's actually pretty cool). I really believe, however, that the movie should have been intelligent enough to mention it to the audience.

[–] Lightrend 12 years ago

Hm, maybe. Personally I think that the only problem with people not knowing more about whales, is that it makes it possible for less-ethical fishermen to kill them in the wrong way.

Fishermen mostly use nets. When catching BIG fish (like sharks), you either use a sturdier net, or a harpoon tied to a metal wire. This is fully acceptable, because the inferior and cold-blooded fish (such as sharks) are simply too stupid to benefit from any other treatment.

But when a warm-blooded mammal with an advanced brain (not to mention lungs) gets caught in a net, and is put to death with random and careless spear-strikes, it is a whole other story. The poor animal will continue to struggle for freedom, as it is fully aware of what is being done to it.

IF whales are to be hunted, I would recommend a very high-caliber shot of some sort (harpoon/gunshot/grenade), directly into the animals brain/heart, before anything else has been done to it. Just like hunting deer - the less suffering the better.

[–] jaybirdjon 12 years ago

The mahi-mahi or common dolphin fish (Coryphaena hippurus) is a surface-dwelling ray-finned fish found in off-shore temperate, tropical and subtropical waters

[–] cornfed_bc 12 years ago

"A human actually has very little use of knowing the difference between fish and whales"

HAHAHA, that's hiliarious. I'm sure you could apply that reasoning to many, many things we "learn" in school.

[–] Keester 12 years ago

Joking or not what they should have done is have somebody correct him. Especially as he uses the word fish more than once.

But then again how many movies have I seen where a chimpanzee is referred to as a monkey when they are really apes.