A modern day Odyssey that takes flight.
For the past few months, I’ve been asked different questions about Christopher Nolan’s film version of “The Odyssey.” One question was about the IMAX format and whether or not it could crop off the cyclops head. The answer was “No.” And a recent question regards someone not understanding it. My answer was that I learned about Greek Mythology in High School, so I think it was a movie for those who learned about it and understood it. I even made a joke to a friend of my mine saying: “Homer knows his Sh*t.”
“If I Go Will They Miss Me” doesn’t have the budget of that film, but it is almost as electrifying and visually stunning as that film. “What does “The Odyssey” have to do with this movie?,” you may ask. We meet Lil Ant (Bodhi Dell), who likes to see the world with joy and serenity as any kid should, and he loves planes and Greek Mythology. It’s a poetic movie that uses both favorites to bring out the kid’s reality. He needs to find the joys of life, but he must also realize there are difficulties within. Not everything can be sugarcoated, but that doesn’t mean he’s forced to be sad. And both movies feature their own distances between fathers and sons, and what their joineries unfold for each other.
The location is Watts, California. When his father Big Ant (J. Alphonse Nicholson) goes to prison and eventually comes home, he does compare him with Odysseus in “The Odyssey.” In fact, he likes to compare his family with the names of Greek Mythology. He likes to think of his dad as Pegasus the winged horse, and his mom (Danielle Brooks) as Medussa with her hair braids. And like my nephew George, he also uses planes as inspirations in his life, like when he and the other kids in white shirts extend their arms out.
Unfortunately, his father has been quite distant with him ever since his incarnation. He tells him not to draw pictures of him, but he can’t help it. And he also spends more time with his girlfriend than he does with his family. Both elements lead up to powerful arguments that in lesser hands could have been very loud. But they’re pull of passion and heart, as we acknowledge that Lil Ant is just a kid and Big Ant is an adult with broken promises.
The movie works as a visual piece. Besides the boys acting like planes, as I’ve mentions, the best also regards a TV set on the train tracks, and three friends walking down on it as if they’re remaking a scene from “Boyz n the Hood.” And another is when Big Ant takes Lil Ant to the beach and “Odyssey” ships are out on the horizon. And none of these scenes are expensive, but they sure look like they are. That’s how visually impressive this movie is.
We don’t get all the basis of the characters, but we do get insights from the boy, his father, and his mother, and they’re all well-acted by Dell, Nicholson, and Brooks. The filmmaker of “If I Go Will They Miss Me” is Walter Thompson-Hernandez, who based it on his own short film, and draws us into the realities of his characters. The African-American themes here are as poetic as the Greek mythology and planes Lil Ant adores, and they all represent life in their own unique ways. It doesn’t rely on angry racism to tell a story; it relies on these characters to speak through their family drama through art and passion. And despite the father-son pathos I’ve mentioned, this movie is anything but angry.
I doubt my friends will be asking me about “If I Go Will They Me” as much as they’ve been asking me about “The Odyssey,” but I am a film critic who appreciates the little, finer things in life. So, this is an independent movie that deserves your valuable time and won’t leave you jet lagged.
In Select Theaters This Friday