The Playlist by Andrew Crump

In Chow’s hands, the lens becomes an elastic guidance tool for comic energy: fixate on a single image, pull back the band, let go, and snap, his story and characters launch forward in a blur of madcap amusement.

Los Angeles Times by Martin Tsai

Crass and macabre, yet big-hearted, it makes a wonderfully adult bedtime story.

RogerEbert.com by Simon Abrams

The Mermaid will make you laugh. It doesn't matter if you don't like subtitles. It doesn't matter if you've never heard of the director. It doesn't matter if you've never seen a Chinese movie in your life. It will make you laugh. Guaranteed.

New York Magazine (Vulture) by Bilge Ebiri

Mermaid is a very, very funny movie, but its caustic swipes at China’s nouveau riche, combined with its despairing look at the devastation of the country’s environment, suggest a filmmaker trying to find ways to reconcile his buoyant sense of fun with deeper, darker themes.

The New York Times by Glenn Kenny

While second-guessing the marketing strategies of movie conglomerates is happily not the concern of this reviewer, it does seem a shame that this exhilarating, bizarre, good-hearted, blatantly obvious sci-fi-fantasy-slapstick eco-fable isn’t getting wider fanfare.

The Film Stage by Michael Snydel

While the story doesn’t always hold together, it remains moving.

The A.V. Club by Jesse Hassenger

A relatively straightforward comic love story/environmental parable, it’s a sharper bit of whimsy than CJ7 and less weighed down with mythology than Journey To The West.

Screen Daily by James Marsh

Newcomer Jelly Lin brings a delightfully quirky demeanour to her literal fish out of water.

Variety by Maggie Lee

Stephen Chow’s The Mermaid defies the time-worn nature of its material, concocting pure enchantment with the director’s own blend of nutty humor, intolerable cruelty and unabashed sweetness.

The Hollywood Reporter by Elizabeth Kerr

With no time for allegory or parable, the fantastical Mermaid delivers its message without a shred of subtlety (and is unapologetic about it) but with considerable charm, wit and darkness to make up for it.

Screen International by James Marsh

Newcomer Jelly Lin brings a delightfully quirky demeanour to her literal fish out of water.

Entertainment Weekly

The Mermaid is at its best when it embraces the ridiculous, no-holds-barred, farcical comedy that Chow has become known for, thanks to films like Kung Fu Hustle and Shaolin Soccer.

The Guardian

This live-action cartoon finds Stephen Chow (Shaolin Soccer) elevating a Disneyish set-up – ruthless developer is mollified by the mermaid inhabiting the lagoon he’s plundering – with more of his usual good-to-inspired sight gags.