Help, I’m A Fish (otherwise titled as A Fish Tale) isn’t a movie that many people outside of Europe will most likely be able to recognize. Originally created in Denmark and would later get an American release in the early 2000s, this Danish-German Irish co-production is a very underground movie that not a lot of people would know too much about or even know how to search it out. That is kind of a shame, as the film is honestly pretty decent for what’s its offering. In a beach side city, three American kids; older brother Fly (voiced by Jeff Pace), little sister Stella (voiced by Michelle Westerson) and cousin Chuck (voiced by then-unknown Aaron Paul) all sneak out behind their parents backs (voiced by John Payne, Teryl Rothery and Pauline Newstone) to go fishing, but they instead find a mysterious laboratory run by a crazy professor named MacKrill (voiced by Terry Jones) who is an underwater researcher who has apparently created a potion that can turn humans into fish. After Stella accidentally drinks the potion and is thrown mistakenly into the sea by Fly, both the boys decide to take the potion and follow after her, with the knowledge that they will need to drink the antidote before time is up or they will remain fish permanently. After reuniting with Stella, the three start being hunted down by a fish named Joe (voiced by Alan Rickman) who has come across the fish antidote and upon gaining intelligence now wants more of the antidote to slowly turn himself into a human and control the surface world. The kids have two days to escape the psychotic fish and return to their human forms before they remain fish forever. The easiest way to describe this movie is simply charming. It’s not a film that’s incredibly game-changing by animated movie standards or even that unique from a visual standpoint next to other animation studios, but as a whole, it has a lot going for it like enjoyable characters, good voice acting, beautiful 2D animation, and a surprisingly dark tone, making it a nice one to pick up and discover.

The plot for the film written by Stefan Fjeldmark, Karsten Kiilerich, John Stefan Olsen, and Tracy J. Brown is nothing that unexpected for this kind of movie, as the idea of kids with varying personalities being flung into a crazy situation that they are forced to endure before a specific time limit has been reached, feels like something that’s been tackled several times through various plot lines, and the fact that they become fish isn’t that new either as transformation stories are equally as repetitive. Because of this, the movie is incredibly easy to grasp from the get-go and you can see the lessons and obstacles that will be overcome by the end of the film a mile away. It’s also a pretty short film, only clocking in over the 1-hour mark realizing its simple premise and not wasting too much time. But even if something has been done before, charming elements can make recycled material worthwhile, and the film does have a good chunk of that. It has a very likeable atmosphere to it that isn’t too squeaky clean but is all-round just a fun experience, as something about the characters, the animation, the environments, and the way the characters interact off each other always feels genuine and very endearing. The kids, as well as most of the people in this movie, act in a way that feels a bit more natural and less forceful than other kids’ movie of this tone and style can act like at times, and while it never goes too far with the language or attitude, it still leaves an impression. The more shocking twist about this movie is that despite its cutesy childish premise, its surprisingly dark and intense in several moments throughout the film. Though nothing particularly scary is shown, the film’s tone isn’t afraid to take kids into a more intense area, they will show little amounts of blood, fish will be eaten on-screen without much flinching, even the climax is actually quite grim and even a little shocking in what it gets away with presenting. The direction taken by Fjeldmark, Michael Hegner and Greg Manwaring gives the production a bit more of an edge which elevates its above just another simple kid’s flick with its babyish set-up and it matched in tone. Sometimes the handling of its messaging can be a little poor handled. The main kid is constantly getting out of his problems by talking his way through the situations and confusing his enemies into getting what he needs, he eventually learns to use his brain and do what, the exact same thing to the main bad guy that he did to every other problem he came across, it didn’t feel like the actions they show correspond with how he changed.

All the characters in this have the risk of being either too bland or too annoying given the premise and look of the story, but all of them are actually pretty likeable. The three leads are very much presented and written in a typical kids-movie fashion with cliched personalities, roles and even voices for this kind of story, but the writing doesn’t feature any dumb one-liners or catch-phrases to make them feel hip, their identities are a little stale but are used well in the story, and the voice acting from all of them is really solid. Despite their age, it never feels like they are having trouble with the lines and get across everything they need to pretty effectively (it’s pretty funny knowing that Jesse from Breaking Bad would star in a movie where he’s a nerdy Jellyfish) The villain is also pretty good, despite having a name that is literally the least threatening name imaginable (it’s almost a cliche to mock supposed threatening people with simplistic names like this), the design is pretty memorable with the long blacked-out lines around his eyes and mouth, his weirdly shaped body, and purple colouring scheme, Alan Rickman, as usual, is fantastic as the part and does great at making him sound both sophisticated and psychotically violent at the same time, and even with his small appearance and bright color scheme, his voice, expressions and casual attitude towards killing fish, even children, is pretty imposing. Granted his plan is pretty generic as well as vague, but he gets some good lines, both funny and threatening, he has a cool villain song despite not being sung very well, and he has a pretty messed up death scene that won’t be forgotten anytime soon. The scientist is done okay, if a bit generic, and Monty Python writer Terry Jones as the voice is pretty distinct if a bit annoying, and the parents are also pretty bland and forgettable, but since the kids and the villains are handled well and they are the focus of the film, it feels like it works out.

The film’s animation is also really good. Gorgeous looking 2D animated films were nothing new at the time this film was released (Disney was still during an era where they actually cared to put out 2D animated films) but for a movie that feels pretty underground and only has a budget of about $5.6 million, it’s surprising how much effort went into the colors, the backgrounds, the expressions, the line-work, everything looks really good. This makes more sense once you realized that one of the uncredited directors, Greg Manwaring, worked in the animation department for various well-known and highly regarded 2D animated movies like The Iron Giant, An American Tail, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and The Lion King. All the characters have such well-drawn designs that are incredibly memorable on first glance, as even when they transform into fish, from the expressions and color scheme (and the essential clothing and hair), it’s obvious who’s who. The CG implementation isn’t very good unfortunately, they do just look like toys you would use in a bathtub and feel like a massive downgrade compared to the much better 2D work, but those portions aren’t seen a lot and the rest of the time, its stellar to look at from the colors, the design of the underwater world as well as the human world, and the overall expressions on both the fish and the human characters. The film’s music isn’t the films strongest point either. The background music by Søren Hyldgaard does sometime create some very nice atmospheric mood, but the movie also has songs, but only two are really sung. One done by the scientist, which is okay but not very good when it comes to the lyrics and singing, and the villain song which has great show tune style theatrics to it with great background music that’s both over-dramatically upbeat and menacing at the same time, even though Rickman himself is not the best singer. The real problem comes when the film inserts pop songs in, mainly ones from artists like Lou Bega and short-lived Danish pop girl-group, Little Trees. They feel pretty forced in and keep this movie from being otherwise perfectly timeless, especially with one painfully including a rap.

Even if it’s pretty simple and arguably has some glaring issues in regard to ironing out some of its messages as well as its soundtrack, Help, I’m a Fish is actually much better than it deserves to be. Though the plot is predictable, there’s a lot about this movie that isn’t in the slightest, as the tone is surprisingly dark without losing its inviting atmosphere, the characters are stereotypical, but very likeable and well-acted, the villain is fun, the 2D animation is really good, and it actually managed to be a dub from a foreign creation that doesn’t entirely suck (you’d be surprised how often that happens).  It’s not very well known, but it at least deserves a watch to witness its secret charm. Not much for adults to get into besides maybe some of the darker scenes, but for little kids it will entertain them nicely. Dive on in and pay witness to this little tale.

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