To go by a select few recent horror and genre titles, toilet cubicles can be pretty dangerous places. In Stalled (2013), a janitor has to deal with a zombie outbreak; in Glorious (2022), a man has to contend with a Lovecraftian entity – all of which whilst trapped inside a toilet stall. There have been others, but these films in particular are supernatural flicks, where the pre-existing vulnerability of being trapped in a confined space with limited vision and space is used to increase the jeopardy. As it turns out, there’s plenty of jeopardy to be had in a toilet stall, with or without supernatural monsters outside. In Flush (2025), we’re locked in again, only this time in a French nightclub, with a middle-aged coke user called Luc (Jonathan Lambert).
Luc has arrived in this nicely grimy club in an effort to win back his ex, a bar worker there – who rebuffs the attempt, via phone, the second she’s made aware of it. His aim seems to be to arrange a supervised meeting with their young daughter, but you get a fair idea of why the little girl isn’t living with them when Luc prepares himself to talk to Val (Élodie Navarre) by… doing a line. Heading to the bathroom in a tiz after their conversation, Luc manages to get his foot stuck in the toilet (a possibility offered up by the presence of squat toilets, as used in various parts of the world – and in this charming establishment). It’s actually the lesser of the visual metaphors offered up by the film, and a reasonably plausible event when stumbling around under the influence.
However, things progress. The man who sold him his coke turns up in the same bathroom and immediately assumes Luc is here looking for a large score which has been hidden – in the toilet. Wrong time, wrong place; wrong time to be high as a kite, too. The dealer, Dindon (Rémy Adriaens) and the club’s boss, Sam (Elliot Jenicot) are certain Luc is up to no good, so they make the time-honoured decision to beat him shitless, leaving him there until closing time so they can come and very definitely retrieve their stash, which they remain certain he has (and they’re right, by the way: Luc has by now found it, and as a coke fiend can think of only one way to conceal such a large amount of cocaine). If it was bad enough having his foot stuck in the toilet, Luc is left in a far worse position, and has to do…something, anything to try and get himself out of there.
This catalogue of errors draws in more people and takes on different forms, modulating its levels of humour and horror. It’s not above playing with the ick factor – how could it be? – though it takes some time out from bobbing tampons and glory holes to spend time with a small but perfectly-formed number of larger-than-life characters, including Luc; Lambert does an impressive amount of acting for a man very much stuck in a toilet. It’s hard not to feel some sympathy for the guy, as instantly challenging as Luc’s character is; here, physically restricted, horribly wounded (this is a nasty film in places), he here gets his opportunity to play the grown man who cried ‘Wolf’. For various reasons, some obvious and some more subtle, no one really wants to take time out to help Luc. He is sort of trying to be there for his daughter, after all, even if the groundwork he prepares is not fit for purpose.
Regardless of the backstory which director Grégory Morin and writer David Neiss are able to weave, and despite the film’s very modest 70-minute runtime, there was still a danger of this film outstaying its welcome, at least from a visual perspective. Happily, the team manage to swerve this with a surprisingly diverse array of camerawork, lurid colour and lighting, a thrumming background soundtrack (which moves into the fore at key points) and a great handle on pace. By understanding Chekov’s gun and making much of all of the opportunities for further misunderstandings and crises, Flush is a taut, well-balanced film which gets the absolute best out of its key ideas.
This decidedly non-supernatural film about a guy trapped in a toilet stall could quite easily be seen as a modern allegory for the after-effects of a long run of shit choices; equally it can be enjoyed on its own terms, so long as claustrophobia doesn’t trouble you too much. All in all, however you want to view it, Flush is an entertaining film which balances its stasis with surprising amounts of action and movement; it even manages to be, dare I say it, poignant in places. Not bad going, for a film – let’s just leave on this point – where a man is wedged very firmly into a toilet.
Flush (2025) received its world premiere at the Fantasia International Film Festival on 27th July.