User reviews

Sensitively animated on paper, 'Sleeping with the Fishes' brings you into a world where fishmongers fall in love, fishes become cupidons and lovers cuddle in the middle of the sea.

Yousif Al-Khalifa's animation brings you far away from 3D, with a traditional animation made on paper, where poetic characters tremble gracefully through the narration and blotches of color elegantly move on the page. One discovers again the beauty of anti-stereotypes imagery; not only a courageous choice but also a decision fitting perfectly to this story… where fishmongers fall in love. Youssif Al-Khalifa's skillful pen scratches give to this animation all its emotion.

A very justified 2014 BAFTA win - Romain Hemeray

An odd animation this one, the type which is too easily dismissed as art student fare. The plot sees a fishmonger shunning human contact and only ever content at home in her bath with her fish. In art student film style, the animation style is by hand, it features nudity, and is distinctly weird in its content. However, with all this it is surprisingly engaging - and mostly this is because of how well it presents its emotions within its lead character.

She is shut down but the film gives us enough to feel for her, rather than just see her as being difficult. She also shows a lot on the edges of her actions which link to those within her private moments in the bath. While a lot of the specifics of the film tend towards the absurd, it is this observational core that makes it work. The animation is deliberately lacking in polish, and has great character. The sound work is also effective as it draws out the fleshy noises of the workplace, and lacks dialogue to have to overdo anything.

At first glance, it does look like a deliberately difficult art student piece, but there is much here to enjoy, and much it does well.