Flattened

The scouts

The surrealism-wrapped-in-sitcom-aesthetics thing is a decent subversion, but dialogue-free trauma processing in a 90s cul-de-sac feels like it's playing it safe underneath the weird—the contrarian move would've been to actually *say* something.

Godfrey and Abbott are clearly fluent in the grammar of constraint-based storytelling; the formal discipline of silence and deadpan tone recalls a lineage from Haneke through to contemporary minimalist practice, though the surreal register occasionally undermines that rigor.

The choice to let the late-90s production design and the friends' physical avoidance—rather than exposition—carry the entire emotional weight is what transforms a modest premise into something that breathes; that restraint, that bet on the image, is where the film lives.

Reviews

Flattened, a psychological curiosity from co-directors Julia Godfrey and Will Abbott, occupies a delightfully disorienting space amongst these ticky-tacky little boxes through deliberate, meticulous precision, with the directorial duo having crafted a surreal descent into the aftermath of a traumatic incident that unfolds over 24 hours in a picture-perfect neighbourhood. Flattened is a testament to how independent filmmaking constraints can be transformed into creative strengths when wielded by filmmakers with a clear, compelling vision.