The Poetic Inner-City Melancholy of ‘If I Go Will They Miss Me’

Right from the jump, If I Go Will They Miss Me establishes itself as a sunnier, more colorful update on Killer of Sheep.

The movie begins with a prologue set to executive producer Jon Batiste’s cover of Dinah Washington’s “This Bitter Earth,” which was practically the theme song for Charles Burnett’s low-budget, black-and-white 1970s masterwork. Just like Killer of Sheep, If I Go tells the story of a Black man having trouble being a father and provider for his Watts-based family.

This time around, the emotionally stunted brotha is Big Ant (J. Alphonse Nicholson, who fans of HBO’s Lanterns might recognize as a young version of character John Stewart’s dad), an ex-con who can’t seem to maintain his family-man duties. His girl Lozita (Danielle Brooks, all curves and compassion) encourages him to spend more time with his son Little Ant (the coolly precocious Bodhi Jordan Dell). Little Ant is a sensitive soul who reveres his old man, and usually draws his dad as a Pegasus-riding Poseidon. But Big Ant would rather be out in the street, engaging in sketchy activity and hanging out with his side piece.

Part drama, part tone poem, If I Go delves into how difficult it can be for Black men to raise their sons, especially when they don’t know how to be men their damn selves. Big Ant starts to worry about losing his son to the streets, especially when they both begin to have visions of white-shirt-wearing boys, taking off in the night like airplanes. (Yes, much like the missing kids in Weapons.)

Flying vessels play a recurring role in the movie, whether they’re airplanes in the clear-blue skies overhead or the toy planes Big Ant and Little Ant play with. I first thought the presence of planes represented the characters’ need to escape their dangerous surroundings. But when a friend tells Big Ant not to let his son “fly away,” I realized the flight stuff is more about Big Ant’s incessant need to take off from his responsibilities — and Little Ant’s desire to soar above the drama.

Just like Killer of Sheep, If I Go is a poetic, emphatic piece of inner-city melancholy. But while Sheep went cinéma vérité in its depiction of the impoverished, soul-crushing squalor dark-skinned Angelenos had to live through back in the ’70s, this film is a visually ebullient affair. Expanding on his 2022 short, writer-director Walter Thompson-Hernández presents modern-day Watts as a hopeful, vibrant working-class neighborhood, filled with glowing Black faces. Much like when Barry Jenkins brought visually hypnotic layers to ghetto life in his Oscar-winning Moonlight, Thompson-Hernández and cinematographer Michael Fernandez work their Panavision equipment in capturing how beautiful (and powerful) Blackness can be.

Staff Picks: 'Killer of Sheep'

Charles Burnett’s Killer of Sheep is the perfect example of a lost masterwork. Shot in 1973 and played at colleges and festivals in 1977, this…

Thompson-Hernández clearly bites from many auteurs, including Terrence Malick (the movie does play like a Black Tree of Life — we even get a shot of a parent floating) and, of course, Spike Lee (you know there’s a double-dolly shot in this). The way he plays with colors and hues, especially when they bounce off the exquisite skin of the cocoa-colored cast (who all give authentic, understated performances), makes me wonder if he’s a fan of music video director Hype Williams’ one and only film, the hood classic Belly.

Despite its cinematic familiarity, If I Go Will They Miss Me is an emotionally stirring experience — a sincere, occasionally surreal study of Black life that you don’t regularly see on these big pale screens. Rich Spirit, the film-distribution company that specializes in releasing artful works by BIPOCs (like the recent Black-diaspora bouillabaisse BLKNWS: Terms & Conditions), has once again given audiences a film in which Black people shine brightly, even during their darkest days.