‘If I Go Will They Miss Me’ Review – Finding Poetry In South L.A. [Sundance 2026]

If I Go Will They Miss Me feels like a film made by someone who trusts images as much as words, and who understands that the space between a father and a son can be filled with longing, fear, and imagination all at once. Writer-director Walter Thompson-Hernández expands on his earlier short with a confidence that’s immediately apparent, crafting a story that blends social realism with myth and visual poetry without losing its emotional grounding. It’s a film that reaches upward while staying rooted in a very specific place and experience, and that balance is what makes it extraordinary.

Set in the working-class Watts neighborhood of South Los Angeles, the film centers on twelve-year-old Lil Ant (Bodhi Dell), a sensitive, observant boy who is struggling to understand his father, Big Ant (J. Alphonse Nicholson), recently released from prison. Big Ant’s return home doesn’t bring the relief or clarity Lil Ant might have hoped for. Instead, it introduces uncertainty. His father is present but distant, physically imposing yet emotionally guarded, and Lil Ant is left trying to reconcile the man in front of him with the myth he’s built in his head. As this tension simmers, Lil Ant begins seeing visions of boys drifting through his neighborhood, figures that feel both spectral and deeply familiar. These apparitions are not explained in literal terms. They function as emotional and cultural echoes, tying personal experience to something larger and more communal.

The father-son relationship sits at the heart of the film, and it’s handled with remarkable care. J. Alphonse Nicholson delivers a textured performance as Big Ant. He presents a tough exterior shaped by survival and past mistakes, but beneath that is someone who still carries the vulnerability of the kid Lil Ant describes in his opening voiceover. Nicholson never overplays this duality. You sense it in his posture, in how he holds himself back during moments that call for tenderness. Big Ant is a man afraid of failing again, and that fear shapes every interaction with his son.

Bodhi Dell is equally impressive as Lil Ant. He captures this quiet intensity and confusion of a child who is constantly watching, absorbing, and trying to make sense of adult contradictions. Lil Ant idolizes his father and just wants to be accepted by him, and he does an incredible job at conveying these complicated emotions. Danielle Brooks, meanwhile, brings warmth and steadiness as Lozita, grounding the household with a performance that feels lived-in and natural. She understands the cost of holding things together and the exhaustion that comes with loving people who are still figuring out how to love themselves.

Visually, the film is just so stunning from start to finish. Thompson-Hernández and his cinematographer frame Watts with care and reverence, finding beauty in everyday spaces without romanticizing hardship. The film is filled with carefully composed shots that feel intentional rather than ornamental. There’s a strong photographic sensibility at work, one that understands how light, movement, and stillness can convey emotion. Airplanes passing overhead, a recurring presence under the LAX flight path, become a quiet visual motif, reinforcing ideas of escape, distance, and unreachable freedom.

The film’s use of mythology and folklore is where it takes its biggest artistic swings. Greek gods, flight imagery, and references to Pegasus weave their way through the narrative, not as intellectual exercises but as extensions of Lil Ant’s inner life. These elements reflect how children often process pain and confusion through imagination, turning reality into something symbolic and expansive. Thompson-Hernández treats these moments with restraint. The magical realism never overwhelms the grounded storytelling. Instead, it deepens it, giving form to emotions that would otherwise remain unspoken.

The ghostly boys Lil Ant sees are especially powerful. They feel like remnants of something lost, embodiments of shared heritage, memory, and unrealized futures. The film resists the urge to spell out their meaning, trusting the audience to feel their significance rather than decode it. That trust is one of the film’s strengths. It doesn’t flatten its ideas into messages. It allows ambiguity to exist, much like the relationship at its center.

There are clear influences here, particularly Barry Jenkins and ReMell Ross, in the way the film marries lyrical imagery with social observation. But If I Go Will They Miss Me never feels derivative. Thompson-Hernández has his own voice, one rooted in tenderness and attentiveness. He understands that masculinity, especially within communities shaped by systemic pressure, is often taught through silence and endurance rather than expression. The film interrogates that inheritance without condemnation, showing how easily distance can be mistaken for strength.

If the film has a limitation, it’s that its looseness may frustrate viewers looking for traditional narrative momentum. The story unfolds more like a series of emotional impressions than a tightly plotted arc. Some threads drift in and out without resolution, mirroring the uncertainty Lil Ant feels about his father and his future. But this approach feels deliberate. The film isn’t trying to solve these relationships. It’s trying to witness them honestly.

By the time If I Go Will They Miss Me reaches its final moments, it has established itself as a major artistic statement from a filmmaker with a clear sense of purpose. Thompson-Hernández has made something deeply personal that also feels communal, a portrait of family, legacy, and place that understands how imagination can become a survival tool. It’s a film that looks at a boy searching for connection and finds poetry in that search, reminding us that sometimes the most profound stories are the ones that dare to drift, to wonder, and to ask questions that don’t have easy answers.

If I Go Will They Miss Me had its World Premiere in the NEXT section of the 2026 Sundance Film Festival. 

Director: Walter Thompson-Hernández

Writer: Walter Thompson-Hernández

Rated: NR

Runtime: 92m