Flow: A Magnificently Empathetic Tour De Force

Though we often take it for granted, you'll likely admit that water is something of an anomaly if you take ample time to consider it. There's nothing else quite like it in nature. Our bodies need it. If we have too little of it, we die. And if we have too much of it, we also die. We can look in a body of water and see ourselves staring back at us. Sometimes, we love what we see. Other times, not so much. That's pretty cool, but when was the last time we acknowledged water as interesting when we weren't watching Nat Geo? It's often only when it's our immediate need, the absolute last thing that we want, or we're watching a documentary that we stop to think about water, even though it makes up well more than half of what we would call nature, and even though we would die if we didn't have it. Sometimes it takes a movie about water to make us think about it, so perhaps that's why it's on my mind right now. And all that said, Flow is a wonderful European animated film about a semi-biblical-caliber flood and the boat-faring animals that have to put aside their differences for the sake of surviving it. This movie finds such undeniable beauty and wonder in water, and such danger as well. Yes, it will make you think about it.

The animation of Flow is so incredibly unusual. It looks far less like the 3D-animated aesthetic we've come to expect from a studio like Pixar, and far more like an open-world video game - and this isn't a bad thing. Flow manages to capture such a unique perspective of beauty with it's visual approach, manages to look, sound, and act majestic and big. It's a radically different visual blueprint that easily could have backfired in the wrong hands, but I like how confident this film is in it's visuals, how assured it is of it's world's capacity to amaze. By and large, Flow is a very quiet movie, letting you sit in it's rapidly-submerging world and consider the lives, needs, and wants of the animals populating it. But periodically, it just lets itself be big and indulge in the work of it's animators. The film ranges from pinpointedly intimate to majestically grand, and the sheer majesty of much of this film's world can often be entirely engrossing, beautifully overwhelming. And yet these two seemingly-opposites never seem to clash for attention.

Flow is an exercise in technical skill, storytelling prowess, and empathy, grand and spectacular and yet endlessly personal. It puts five very different animals together in a cramped space after an immeasurably catastrophic flood, and forces them to work together and see the world from a different perspective for the sake of the survival of everyone aboard the boat. Necessarily, this movie builds such distinct character with zero dialogue. Each of the animals in the boat is different from the others, and this is made impressively obvious without so much as a word being spoken. It was always obvious to me how each animal was feeling in a given moment, and this is just a testament to the care that went into the animation and pinpoint visual storytelling of Flow. It's command of visual language is just phenomenal, it's contemplation of every little thing it shows and does distinguished. With such an effective one-two punch of spectacle and intimacy, Flow isn't just watched. It's experienced. The eye of the filmmakers for beauty is remarkable, and it's animation delivers this beauty wonderfully.

Plot-wise, the narrative framework of Flow is quite unusual. The animals in this film aren't working towards an established, tangible goal at the end of the rainbow so much as they are learning to coexist. There's no checklist of things they need to complete to get their hands on the MacGuffin. This would normally be a problem, but what this means for Flow is that what it sacrifices in momentum, it gains in silent but effective and affecting characterization. In a lot of ways, I didn't really realize how invested I had become in the lives of the animals in Flow until they found themselves in danger. A simple story told well holds a lot of power, and Flow leverages that power to some remarkable ends, crafting a cat video like no other, one that is more than willing to meditate on the story it's trying to tell.

Flow is an animated movie unlike anything else I've seen to date. It's refreshingly mature without being edgy, emotional without being overly-sentimental, beautiful without being tiring. It's like watching an episode of Calm, some kind of indie game developer, and Noah's flood strike a deal, and it's command of natural beauty, distinctive animation, and visual storytelling is remarkable. Earlier this month, it won the award for Best Animated Feature at the Oscars, and it's easy to see why. Whatever you may think of awards shows, this accolade was entirely deserved. It's encouraging to see small, independent movies like this one taking home awards the likes of a prestigious Oscar, because it means two things: one - the playing field is being leveled. And two - big studios are going to have to step up their game. All product and no art makes Jack a dull reviewer. Let's hear it for art.

Flow - 10/10

Genesis 7:17-23