I’ve seen a lot of people complain that Flow felt like an extended video game cutscene. And it’s true that the film is in conversation with videogames. Specifically the work of Fumito Ueda, whose sparse, barren worlds hint at but don’t explain their history which allows you to project your own emotions and interpretations onto the story.

If you’re going to copy anyone, copy the master, right? Flow does all this along with the added difficulty of telling a complex story through the believable gestures and motions of a range of animals. This is every bit as magical as the hype would have you believe. A remarkable achievement.