A young girl suspended in the water of a dingy bathtub, three tiny goldfish suffocate in a girl's hand- these are the first images of Fishbowl, a film written and directed by Julie Wiles. The young girl is Sadie Shipley (Rebekah Kay) a mousy and contemplative girl who runs the fishbowl game with her father in a traveling carnival. These tiny shimmering fish come to represent Sadie's desperate life as her father spirals further out of control. Through a malaise of boredom, pain and hopelessness Sadie spends her days experimenting with drugs, attempting to emulate a garish young burlesque dancer and always trying to rescue the goldfish from her brutish father. But this life all becomes too much for Sadie and eventually even fairground goldfish need a bigger bowl to swim in.
