Actually, God is a Whale : Flow

If you haven’t watched Flow, I can’t recommend it enough. I’ll be honest that I wasn’t too sure about the film at first - while the idea of an animal movie without dialogue appealed to me, I didn’t know if I could tolerate it for the entire runtime. Add to that the animation which, despite apparently being notable somehow, felt more like a long videogame cutscene than a film, and I had subconsciously put it on my “skip” list… until my brother invited me to a showing.

That’s when I realised how much I almost missed.

Flow tells the story of a cat whose world one day ends as an enormous flood pours in. Despite trying to get to dry land, the water just keeps rising, and in the end the cat’s only hope is to hitch a ride on a capybara’s sailboat. What follows is a journey in search of hope and survival which a dog, a ring-tailed lemur, and a secretary bird join over time. I’d tell you more about the film, but a) I don’t want to spoil you and b) I can't really figure out how to put into words. Just watch it. And when you do, come back, because spoiler alert : it’s not about a cat, and it’s not about a flood.

The most obvious hints that this film isn’t about animals or a natural disaster are the characters and scenery. While cats and dogs can be found basically worldwide at this point, capybaras are native to South America, ring-tailed lemurs to Madagascar, and secretary birds to sub-Saharan Africa. Immediately, it doesn’t seem like these animals should exist in the same area - perhaps because they aren’t animals?

Well maybe there’s just a zoo nearby you might say. That seems unlikely give that the cat's house is in the middle of the forest, but fine, let’s assume all the animals came from a zoo. How do you explain the northern lights being seen from what looks like a tropical or sub-tropical area? I’m not an expert in architecture, but the buildings are far more reminiscent of southern and eastern Asia than the North Pole.

And probably more importantly, why does it seem like the animals are trying to get something that suspiciously similar to the Pillars of Creation nebula?

The way I see it, the cat is actually a person - one who's unfortunately passed away. What it’s experiencing isn’t a flood, but death and the afterlife. We first see the cat in a home surrounded by cat statues, so it isn’t too far of a leap to say that the cat is their “spirit animal”. The other animals, too, are most likely people (and not something like spirit guides) since the secretary crane pretty unambiguously reaches Nirvana during the journey. It even helps to explain some of their more human affect (a choice I found a bit annoying if I'm honest). Hell, if I wanted to push it, I'd the sailboat be seen as an allusion to the Charon ferrying people over the River Styx.

Through this lens, Flow becomes a beautiful metaphor. Even before I'd realised what the film was about, I was horrified when other people in the audience were laughing at the cat's struggles - did they not understand that it’s an animal that can’t understand what’s happening? Can they not imagine how terrifying that would be? Once I realised the film was about the afterlife, though, it hit me - when we die, if anything comes after, who’s to say that we will understand it any more than a cat understands a flood? Humans might be the most capable life form in the physical world, but I wouldn't be surprised if we're a lower lifeform in the spiritual realm.

And yeah, as I mentioned, the whale is God. A being not on the journey, but there to save the cat when needed. In the end, it even sacrifices itself to save the other animals - a bit like Jesus, wouldn’t you say?

I’m not saying the metaphor is perfect, of course - the end of the film is where it starts to fall apart a bit for me. When the secretary crane ascends and the cat looks at its reflection in the puddle, I wanted the cat to show some sense of surprise that it was a cat, as though it was finally realising it wasn't a weird dream. I don't think the cat should have found the other animals once the flood was gone, either - only cats get nine lives, after all.

Still, I don’t think that invalidates my interpretation. I bet that ending was chosen because my version would make the runtime too short and probably wouldn’t go over well with audiences who thought the film was just about cute animals. So yeah, in the end, Flow isn’t perfect, and not just because of its ending, but it comes pretty damn close. You should absolutely watch it, because if you can look past the imperfections to find the deeper message (which isn’t that hard - I did it after all), you’ll be rewarded with a deeply spiritual experience that leaves you reeling.

Don't worry about having an existential crisis, though - you can always play it off by cracking a joke about how the whale is God. 🐋