In Magnolia (1999), frogs fall from the sky during the film’s climax.
The raining frogs sequence connects several characters during the film’s emotional turning point. Magnolia follows intersecting lives in California’s San Fernando Valley, including a television producer, his estranged son, a quiz-show host, a police officer, and members of a troubled family.
The event is presented as an extraordinary occurrence rather than a conventional explanation of weather. The film draws attention to the biblical passage Exodus 8:2, which describes a plague of frogs, and uses the motif to suggest coincidence, judgment, connection, and the possibility of forgiveness.
Paul Thomas Anderson wrote and directed Magnolia. The ensemble cast includes Julianne Moore, Tom Cruise, Philip Seymour Hoffman, William H. Macy, John C. Reilly, and Jason Robards. The frogs are sometimes misremembered as fish because both are associated with unusual animal-rain stories, but the film’s climactic animals are specifically frogs.