Catfish
USA / 2010 / English / Color / DVD (Original : HD) / 86 min
Directors: Ariel Schulman, Henry Joost
Editing, Co-producer: Zac Stuart-Pontier
Photography: Henry Joost, Ariel Schulman, Yaniv Schulman
Music: Mark Mothersbaugh
Producers: Andrew Jarecki, Marc Smerling, Henry Joost, Ariel Schulman
Production Companies: Supermarché, Hit the Ground Running
Source: SIERRA-AFFINITY
Digital technology provides new twists on old ethical conundrums, as we see in Catfish. The rise of social media seemed to offer libratory possibilities for free interchange, thanks to the anonymity of avatars and electronic mail. As Catfish amply demonstrates, social media also sets the stage for deception. In this case, both the filmmakers and their subjects spin such a tangled web of deceit it becomes impossible to determine what is real and what is fictive.
(From the left)Ariel Schulman, Henry Joost
Ariel Schulman graduated from NYU’s Tisch Film program in 2004 and has worked on over 200 films since. Henry Joost was born in Frankfurt, Germany and spent his childhood travelling the world with his mother, a photographer, and his father, an international banker. Acquaintances since high school, they have been filmmaking partners since 2006 and together founded the New York production company Supermarché. Catfish (2010) was their first feature film, which inspired an MTV reality TV series, Catfish: The TV Show. They co-directed the horror films Paranormal Activity 3 (2011) and Paranormal Activity 4 (2012).