Day 42: Fishing with John (1992)
“Fishing with John” is a fishing show- a weird, candid, tongue-in-cheek, genre bending, celebrity guest starring, self deprecating, and, now and then, semi-fictional fishing show. Though it certainly pays homage to those sleep inducing deep sea sporting shows we have all witnessed at an ungodly late hours on cable, this documentary lampoons the concept of that genre as much as it seems to enjoy it.
Spanning only six episodes, musician and actor John Lurie takes celebrity friends out fishing, in pursuit of usually a particular type of sea creature. From episode to episode, Lurie, who has very little fishing knowledge in his own right, moves around the world, from New York, Jamaica, Costa Rica, Maine, and Thailand, and attempts certain types of fishing while his friends, Jim Jarmusch, Tom Waits, Matt Dillon, Willem Dafoe, and Dennis Hopper, all, in their own particular episodes, join in on the fun. Though there is hardly any character arcs to speak of between episodes, generally Lurie and friend get what they came for and head back to shore.
As you can see, not exactly your normal three act plot structure. At times hilarious and at others moments completely dull, “Fishing with John” seems to thrive on toying with the mundane. Though for fifteen minutes nothing may happen, it is in that last five where things get interesting or weird or both. Silence fills the air for seconds on end, Lurie sits around waiting for an undersea bite, boats go out of harbor and the later back in, and then Tom Waits puts a fish down his pants. It’s absurd, but it knows it just as well as we do.
Of course, one of the best aspect of the project are the celebrity guest stars. While normal fishing shows bring on experts in the field or one time professional fishermen, “Fishing with John” has A-list artistic talent standing around in boats, seemingly growing more frustrated and out of their element the farther the episode progresses. On one episode, Jarmusch leans against the boat and questions, “Why am I here?” On another, Tom Waits walks bewildered through the Jamaican jungle and says to Lurie, “You’re a mess. And you dragged me along on this safari and I don’t know why.” It’s as if Lurie has tricked these individuals with the idea of adventure and then slowly trapped them onto fishing expeditions that none of them were prepared to undertake.
Another weird element of the series is that a narrator, voiced by Robb Webb, accompanies the footage, sometimes explaining what is going on and other times spitting out complete nonsense. At one point, Webb is talking about the Red Snapper fish and then suddenly quips, “Yes, I’d like a bite of that sandwich” as Lurie continues to fish on screen. And, to clarify, this is not Webb speaking as if off the microphone to someone in the studio. He is just, for no good reason, explaining his desire to try “that sandwich.” Also, Webb now and then just lies outright to the television audience as in the forth episode when he declares right before the credits, ”On February 19, John Lurie and Willem Dafoe died of starvation.” Of course, the following episode opens with the Webb exclaiming, “I made a mistake! John is still alive.”
“Fishing with John” is a weird and goofy piece of cinema that uses aspects of documentary film to cause friction between what is seen and what is presented. As you watch Lurie fish with his buddies and Webb’s voice give a stirring and excited depiction of the dull proceedings, you can’t help but be amazed with Lurie crazy storytelling technique, which is, to put lightly, somewhat different.
To learn more about “Fishing with John,” check out Criterion’s page here.
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