Flow (2024) – Review

“FLOW”

Flow is now, before it’s UK release, a historically significant movie. Directed by Gints Zilbalodis, it becomes the first Latvian movie to win an Oscar- winning Best Animated Feature and also being nominated for Best Foreign Language, which is rather twisting the definition for that award, since this is a film with no human dialogue. As such, I don’t really need to talk about the acting per say. 

It’s also a very simplistic plot in a sense. It centres around a small cat that gets caught in a massive flood and is saved by a small boat that is skippered by a capybara. They’re later joined by a large dog that was part of a pack that chased the cat earlier in the film, a lemur that likes to hoard trinkets, and a large bird which I really couldn’t tell what type it was… They travel together across this now flooded world hoping to reach a specific location; a very tall cliff which may or may not be their salvation. 

Right from the top, it sets out that this film is post-apocalyptic, we don’t see much of humanities presence or not- but the film is a bit vague, this may be post-apocalyptic or just an area that humans don’t live in anymore and for whatever reason, animals have been able to thrive. Apart from the boats and trinkets, the only sense of humanity we see is the house that the cat sleeps in to begin with. As a result, the film really reminds me of the video game Stray, only without the robots. Not only because of the fact that they went with photo realistic movement on all of the animals, but because of the fact that you didn’t need a massive explanation around the world and the setting to enjoy it.  Think that with this film you can build any metaphor into the story, it’s quite a typical story about 5 people you wouldn’t expect to get along having to work together to survive- kind of an animal version of The Breakfast Club.

I will stress that the audio design is excellent! I have to give props to the animation too. This film was make or break with its animation, and they have done a fantastic job with it. I think while this film did look great in the cinema, I think it would play slightly better on televisions, because I couldn’t help but notice at some points on my screen it looked a bit muted and so it might look better on a smaller screen. Where it did look better on the bigger screen was how it emphasised the bigger moments of dread, particularly paired with the great audio design in the work, especially because there isn’t much of a soundtrack. 

I haven’t seen an animated film with no dialogue since the Studio Ghibli co-production of The Red Turtle, and that film was incredibly different because it really relied on its soundtrack. This film really forces you to be in the moment, and the animation team did an amazing job achieving that because the animals have clearly had a lot of research put into their designs and movements. If you’ve ever had a cat, you will certainly see your own cat in the lead, since they did an excellent job of replicating cat mannerisms and movements. I’m not so sure how well they got down the sequences where a cat had to swim since anytime you see a swimming cat they’re frantically trying to get out of that situation. But overall, they did a fantastic job. 

The cat and dog are clearly here most of the realism went to, that’s not to say that the same doesn’t apply to the other animals, but those were slightly more on the anthropomorphic side, particularly with the lemur with the hoarding habit, who probably gets the biggest character arc of the movie. 

The cat certainly develops more expressions and behaviour as the film goes on, and it’s certainly not the case that the cat would be able to skipper a boat like it has to in certain situations. 

I will say that when the animation looks great, it is GORGEOUS, this is an amazing looking movie, and I don’t think we would have fallen in love with this movie and these characters otherwise. I really enjoyed my time with them, and there are several moments that have you wondering how this film is going to turn out.

The film kind of has two endings, one that was a bit predictable and one that I wasn’t sure what to make of it, but it serves as a strength as it plays into the film’s ambiguous nature. It also helps that the film has a very brisk running pace, it’s only about 85 minutes long but I swear about 5 minutes were just showing logos of the various companies involved in making and publishing the film.