How Flow, a Latvian Animated Movie with No Dialogue, Is Upending the Awards Race: The Story Is ‘Universal’ (Exclusive)

Flow, Latvia’s wordless adventure story about a cat surviving a fantastical flood, has made quite a splash this awards season.

The modest independent film has upended the animated feature race, going toe-to-toe with the likes of Inside Out 2, Moana 2 and The Wild Robot. Not only has it beaten those Hollywood heavyweights for the National Board of Review Award and been Golden Globe- and Critics Choice-nominated in that category, it’s Latvia’s shortlisted submission for this year’s Best International Feature Oscar. 

“No other Latvian film has had this kind of reach in festivals or distribution,” director and co-writer Gints Zilbalodis tells PEOPLE. “So we’re very happy here in Latvia to be noticed for this.”

Critically acclaimed for its simple tale of animals banding together to survive an apocalypse, Flow is notable for not featuring the chatty cartoon critters audiences might be used to. Instead it’s dialogue-free, capturing the behaviors of a feline protagonist and its new allies with a precision that would feel documentary-like were it not for beautifully dreamy animation.

“Because there’s no dialogue, that makes it more universal,” says Zilbalodis, 31, of the film’s appeal. “It really transcends any cultural boundaries, which means that everyone can understand it. I think that’s something really cool about animation, that it can be understood by pretty much everyone.”

The origins for the script, co-written with Matīss Kaža, were personal for Zilbalodis, whose 2019 animated breakout Away was a short film about a cat’s fear of water. “I wanted to tell a story about how I’m learning to collaborate and how to trust others,” he says of Flow. “I thought the cat would be a great character to put through this experience [and] a good starting point for its character arc. So I revisited that earlier premise and added a bunch of more characters.”

Those include a daffy retriever, a headstrong capybara, a covetous lemur and a mysterious bird, as well as glimpses of more fantastical creatures. “I want to really put you in the cat’s point of view and let you experience the world through the cat’s eyes,” Zilbalodis explains. 

“To me, films are more like music where it’s really about the emotion rather than explanations of stuff,” he adds. “First and foremost, I want to create an emotional experience, which for me is more important than sending a message.”

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Zilbalodis first had an inkling Flow could take on Hollywood’s awards season when it was selected for the 2024 Cannes Film Festival,” which “almost never selects animated films,” he notes. “After that, everything blew up.”

As for Latvia competing in the animated feature race against Disney, DreamWorks and such major studios, Zilbalodis says “there is room for both” types of films. “I’m really glad these more independent films are in the conversation. It’s kind of hard to compete with the big ones! But it’s really exciting.”

Also exciting: meeting his heroes like George Lucas at film festivals. The success of Flow is “really out of my hands now,” says Zilbalodis as he gears up for the Globes, Critics Choice, Spirit Awards and more. “With animation you can control everything, you can create the worlds that you imagine and control every expression of the characters. Once it’s finished, it’s like I’m in this storm trying to stay afloat.”

Flow is in theaters now.