In Lieu of Flowers Review

October 9, 2025 at 7:47pm
By Jason Stettner

It’s the morning of Matisse (Matisse ApSimon-Megens)’s father’s funeral, it’s Hawaiian themed. She’s working up to attend with some support from her boyfriend Talal (Talal Itani). The two are preparing to finally get rolling and that’s when a ghost sort of saunters into their lives. The Ghost (Robert Mcleod) is apparently her father according to Matisse whereas Talal just sort of sees it has a generic ghost or well a person wearing a sheet that’s a ghost.

It’s a strange set of circumstances, yet strangely moving and an interesting thought process behind letting go. A final day together, doing various little activities and events together while having some fun. It’s hard to warm up to a ghost appearing, but it’s a supportive situation and one that I enjoyed.

It’s shot in black and white and honestly isn’t too long as it is a short film. It’s several minutes, but conveys despite a small environment a moving set of interactions that might take up a day. The slow build up of what’s happening, the acceptance and the calming mood of being okay as one sets forward. It’s well designed in terms of set and scene capturing the vibe of the story well within its environment.

The Conclusion

In Lieu of Flowers is a beautiful short film capturing the spirit of saying goodbye in something that’s charming, delightful and a little bit fun. I really enjoyed it finding it odd as I wasn’t expecting a short ahead of the film I was seeing which was Dead Lover but it fit well and setup the next movie quite well for me.

The acting was good and sold the believability of how ridiculous the whole situation might be. I had a couple laughs, felt the sort of pain that was trying to be conveyed and enjoyed the message it was going for. A final good day with just the best listener.

In Lieu of Flowers Review at Theater with Standard Viewing
Screening Provided by Calgary Film

Rating Overall: 8.4