Flow ~ A Capsule Movie Review by Allen Kopp ~

Flow is an animated 2024 film from Latvia. It has no dialogue or human characters, so there’s no prejudice against having to read subtitles because it’s a foreign film. It won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature Film at the 2025 Academy Awards. It’s a special kind of animated film that isn’t just for six-year-olds.

The main character is a handsome Cat with expressive eyes. He is forced to flee his home when he is dispossessed by a flood. Right away we are emotionally invested in what happens to him. He faces many perils, not the least of which is repeatedly falling into the water.

A large, benevolent bird picks him up (he doesn’t like it) in his claws and delivers him to a boat, on which several other animals are traveling. There’s a friendly dog, a not-so-friendly lemur, and a capybara, which is a large woodchuck-like animal, and also the white bird who rescued the cat.

They drift in the boat. A couple of the animals learn to steer, so they take turns keeping the boat pointed in the direction they want. The lemur is mainly concerned with keeping the other animals away from a basket of junk. At one point the Cat dives into the water and catches small fish for everybody.

The terrain through which the animals travel is lovely, green, and verdant. There are signs everywhere of humans having lived there, but they all seem to have departed because of the flood.

Flow is currently being shown on HBO.

Copyright © 2025 by Allen Kopp