FLOW
Cat Grylls.
Top to bottom: The boat heads into an uncertain future; Shared space: the lemur and the capybara; The secretary bird casts its wise eye over the dopey golden retriever.
Director Gints Zilbalodis partly based the film on a seven-minute animated short titled Aqua, which he made as a 15-year-old in high school. That short cut can now be watched on YouTube.
A CAT, A DOG AND A CAPYBARA WALK INTO A BAR...
★★★★★
OUT 21 MARCH / 85 MINS / CERT U
DIRECTOR Gints Zilbalodis
PLOT A cat is forced to flee its quiet home in the woods when flood waters begin to rise. Finding refuge on a boat, it must learn to co-operate with other animals.
STOP US IF you think you’ve heard this one before. In a new family-friendly animated film, a gang of cute animals must overcome obstacles to learn the true meaning of friendship. Sound familiar? On its watery surface, Flow seems to take the form of ghosts of animated past —and yet, there is really nothing quite like it. Made on a shoestring budget by a tiny team in Latvia, Belgium and France, led by multi-talented filmmaker Gints Zilbalodis (whose 2019 feature debut, Away, was similarly awe-inspiring and philosophical), this is a spectacular, singular slice of computer-generated cinema —doing things only animation can do.