There’s a surprisingly rich field of films about fishing out there, and with a sport as infamously slow-paced as that, you could be forgiven for assuming you’re in for a rather dry viewing experience for such a watery affair. Yet, by exploring some of the top streaming options today, we can soon discover movies that use this activity as the setting for deeper plots. 

 

Salmon Fishing in the Yemen

This 2011 movie can be easily found on Netflix, Apple TV+ and Amazon Prime Video. Ewan McGregor stars as Alfred, a salmon fisheries expert who joins financial adviser Harriet (Emily Blunt) in an unlikely project to introduce fly fishing to the Yemen desert. While it’s not afraid to get a bit technical in exploring the challenges inherent to the work, its prime focus is the relationship between the two main characters.

Fishing isn’t just a big part of the movie industry, as it can be seen in many TV shows and documentaries too. Deadliest Catch shows the lives of Alaskan fishing crews while Wicked Tuna follows tuna fleets working off the Massachusetts coast. This subject also turns up in casino games such as Big Bass Splash by Pragmatic Play. It’s played over five reels, with fish symbols containing cash values that an angler comes along to collect. This has become one of the most popular, recurring slot themes, with a Bass Bass series including a variety of titles including a festive version and others with jackpot prizes.

CODA

This 2021 Apple TV+ film was directed by Sian Helder as the English language version of an earlier French-Belgian production. The main characters are a family who own a fishing business, where all of its members are deaf except for daughter Ruby, who wants to be a singer. 

CODA premiered at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival before being released on Apple TV+ later that same year. CODA was classed among 2021’s top films by the American Film Institute and won the Best Picture title at the 94th Academy Awards, marking the first time that a film distributed by a streaming service had won this award. 

Source: Pixabay

Blue Miracle

This 2021 movie stars Dennis Quaid as a bitter, washed-up ship’s captain named Wade who is reluctant to join Omar (Jimmy Gonzales) in a fishing tournament but is eventually persuaded to do so. Critical reception was mixed, with one review in The Guardian branding it an archetypal drama that is perhaps a little bit too formulaic, but ultimately strong enough to leave some good, albeit shallow impressions.

Despite the almost melodramatic storyline, Blue Miracle was in fact based on a true story. Although the events happened in Mexico in real life, the movie was filmed in the Dominican Republic. Other fishing movies like Mending the Line and A River Runs Through It serve as equally character-driven narratives, with fishing as the backdrop that ties the events together.

Fishing, being a millennia-old activity, will surely continue to provide interesting settings and situations for storytellers, the intimate sport providing an apt vehicle for studying our relationship to nature and to our fellow human beings.