While watching Catfish,
I couldn’t help but notice certain similarities between the movie and
Shakespeare’s Cymbeline, most notably
in their themes of deception.
The movie is surrounded by this idea of deception,
not just in its plot (a young man falling for a woman who is not who she says
she is, online) but in the idea of the film itself –did the events recorded
actually happen, did the filmmakers exploit not only their subject (Nev) but
the woman and her family? Throughout the
entire film, we are left questioning what and who is real, and who is truthful.
This reminded me of Cymbeline both thematically and
in plot structure. Like we are left
questioning which online figures are real or simply created personas in Catfish, in Cymbeline the characters are confused about the true identities of
others. We see this misidentification in
Imogen (posing as a boy), Morgan/Belarius (posing as Guiderius and Arviragus’
father), and in Cloten (whom, in death, Imogen mistakes for her husband). These misidentifications drive the plot and
culminate in the end scene, where everyone is revealed as their true self and
things are seemingly well. Likewise, in Catfish, the filmmakers questioning of a
family they know only through Facebook, leads to the culmination of the movie,
where the family is seen as they truly are and the lies are exposed.
I think both the film and the play expose a common
theme: the fear of being deceived and the power of deception. The characters in both works are constantly
speculating on if they are being deceived and in the end, these deceptions have
enormous ramifications and lasting effects on the characters.
Katie, what seems to me especially productive in this comparison is that we don't finally know what to do with all the misrecognition that plagues Cymbeline. Are we to understand the characters as tainted for their lack of insight? Is Innogen less good, her love less pure, because she can't recognize her husband's body? It seems as if in Catfish, too, there isn't a clear answer to this question of what it means to be deceived in someone. Your analysis is strong in this post, but for the fact that it lacks this larger ending: yes, the theme of deception pervades both works, but what does it *do* in each case?
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