Making the film 'animated' creates a remove from the harshness of reality, like erecting a scrim between performer and audience, but it also makes for a certain glow.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Jul 5, 2011

| Original Score: B+ | Oct 18, 2008

The director-writer, David Kaplan, is able to hold our attention, and the film's unusual look lends a magical feeling.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 18, 2008

Without the animation layered on top of the action, the film would be thoroughly lacking in dramatic interest.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Oct 17, 2008

A re-imagining of Cinderella set in a massage parlor in New York's Chinatown, David Kaplan's film juxtaposes grime and exploitation with winsomeness and superstition.

| Oct 10, 2008

Apart from the debut of appealing An Nguyen and a pet fish instead of a magic slipper, there's nothing particularly innovative here, and the film's seedy milieu ensures that it's anything but a kid-friendly fairy tale.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Sep 26, 2008

Year of the Fish is an eye-opener for those unfamiliar with the tribulations many immigrants endure on their road to American citizenship.

| Original Score: B- | Sep 26, 2008

Charming and dreamlike, Year of the Fish wrings every dime out of its low budget with wonderful performances that are by parts adorable, sharp and sweet and certainly worth a look.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Sep 5, 2008

Although writer/director David Kaplan attempts to elevate his amateur narrative attempt with the same rotoscoping animation technique that Richard Linklater used to great effect with "Waking Life" and "A Scanner Darkly," the effect comes across as overwro

| Original Score: C- | Sep 2, 2008

The result [of the animation technique] is similar to the look of Richard Linklater's A Scanner Darkly, but much softer and more fluid. It's ideal for the storybook plot and quite dazzling at times.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Aug 29, 2008

That kind of broadness plays fine in Disney movies, but feels deeply when applied to the world of undocumented sex workers, urban poverty and economic exploitation that looks a lot like 21st-century slavery.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 29, 2008

Too raw for kids and too simplistic for adults.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 29, 2008

David Kaplan's sweet, if superficial, fairy tale won't change the world, but it makes nice use of its setting (Chinatown) and visual style (rotoscope animation).

| Original Score: 3/5 | Aug 29, 2008

An adult fable told with childlike simplicity, Year of the Fish updates an ancient Chinese version of the Cinderella story with imagination, charm and just the right amount of sweetness.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 29, 2008

Kaplan keeps the story breezy and brisk, and provides his down-to-earthily modern fairy tale with an appropriately other-worldly visual style.

| Original Score: 6/10 | Aug 29, 2008

To some degree, it's trying to find the magic in the everyday, but the attempts to ground it are cringe-inducing and problematic.

Full Review | Original Score: B- | Aug 28, 2008

Even animation addicts might find their eyes glazing over at this digitally rotoscoped Cinderella story set in an oh-so-magical modern-day Chinatown.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/6 | Aug 27, 2008

Year of the Fish does feature more than enough clever moments and ideas to compensate for forcing audiences to sit through yet another tale of a woman who needs a man to rescue her from a life of drudgery.

| Aug 27, 2008

Year of the Fish is the kind of really bad movie it takes a lot of misplaced conviction to make.

| Aug 27, 2008

Unfortunately, much of the novelty in 'Year of the Fish' is eclipsed by ethnic stereotypes and an oppressive score

| Aug 26, 2008