‘Flow’: Cannes Review

Dir: Gints Zilbalodis. Belgium/Latvia/France. 2024. 85 mins

Flow is as hard to resist as a pair of plaintive, saucer-shaped eyes peering out from a bundle of fur. Gints Zilbalodis’s second feature is a rousing animated adventure in which a devastating flood obliges an  independent cat to seek allies among the animal kingdom. Technical virtuosity is matched by storytelling vigour and dramatic heft in a film with a ready appeal to ailurophiles and animal lovers of all ages. A Cannes world premiere in Un Certain Regard is followed by an Annecy screening and what should be wide global interest. Sideshow and Janus have acquired North American rights.

The emotional spell it casts is captivating

Returning to the themes of friendship and incredible journeys from his debut Away (2019), which was a Contrechamp award winner at Annecy, Zibalodis sets Flow in a verdant forest where Cat roams at will. A selection of cat sculptures large and small suggest there was once a human resident in the cabin where the cat sleeps.  Every aspect of the animal’s behaviour is convincingly depicted from a paw suspended in mid-air when it hesitates to an arched back at the first sign of danger, the twitching flick of a tail, the serious business of personal grooming and the pleasure of a  satisfying stretch. A soundtrack of squeals, mewls, growls and purring makes it easy to forget that the cat is not real.

When disaster strikes, it has the impact of J.A. Bayona’s The Impossible (2012). A herd of deer stampedes towards salvation and startled birds take to the skies as a tsunami hits, waters rise at an alarming rate and much of the earth disappears beneath the sea. The cat struggles to stay afloat  and eventually finds shelter on a drifting sailboat occupied by a sleepy capybara. Other animals jump on board as their adventure continues, including a lemur and a golden labrador.

Zibalodis manages to invest each creature with a terrific amount of character and individuality. The labrador is a typically friendly, wagged-tail mutt full of energy and friendly overtures. The lemur is constantly beguiled by shiny objects and the detritus from sites that have been abandoned by humans. A wise bird becomes a protector and saviour in many a tight corner.

Flow has echoes of The Life Of Pi (2012) and other seafaring yarns and seems to be lightly sprinkled with movie references. When the cat climbs a boat’s mast and uses its claws to glide down a sail there is all the bravado of Douglas Fairbanks Sr’s famous stunt in The Black Pirate (1926).

Zibalodis ensures that the pace rarely falters as the story sweeps the viewer along through treacherous seas, mysterious ruins, death-defying escapes, poetic night skies that are as blowsy and threatening as a Turner painting and glimmers of hope in the dawning of sunlight. Zibalodis is almost a one-man band when it comes to the creation of the film but credit too to Leo Silly-Pelissier who serves as the director of the 3-D animation.

The breathless adventure is also underpinned by an unexpected emotional response to the story of the bonds forged by the cat and the other animals as they must work in harmony for the sake of survival. A telling moment comes when the once self-sufficient moggy shares his catch of fish with the other inhabitants of the boat.

There is a slight repetitiveness in the film’s closing stages but that is a small flaw in an otherwise enthralling production. There are no human characters in Flow and no dialogue beyond barks and squawks but the sense of peril is compelling, the visuals are impressive and the emotional spell it casts is captivating.