IF
IF is a very sweet movie about reclaiming your childhood sense of innocence and imagination; and it’s bolstered by an incredible voice cast - 7.0/10
Full Disclosure: I had fairly low expectations going into this one. I only saw it because my mom and niece were going anyway. I figured, “Why not go hang out and at the very least, I’ll get an article out of it.”
This was a really good movie. Not great…. but really good. I’d recommend it for anyone six and above. It tries to be the ever-elusive four-quadrant movie, but it has an uneven tone that may leave kids bored and adults in a river of tears.
IF has a fairly simple premise: Imaginary friends (politically correctly referred to as IF’s) lose their creators once they grow up and forget about them. This movie can be seen as an amalgamation of Toy Story, Inside Out, and Monsters, Inc. IF doesn’t have anything astoundingly original to say, but it more than holds its own in a competitive genre.
IF is written and directed by John Krasinski, who has come quite a long way from playing Jim in the American version of The Office. With his work on the A Quiet Place trilogy and now this very well done family film, Krasinski has established himself as a genuine, versatile filmmaker in this exceedingly hard to break into business of Hollywood.
Ryan Reynolds, Steve Carrell (the purple guy), and Cailey Fleming all deliver in this heartfelt modern fantasy.
IF centers around Bea (short for Elizabeth and played by Cailey Fleming), a 12-year old girl who has already lost her mother and is on the verge of becoming an orphan due to her dad’s (Krasinski) unnamed illness. With a dead mom and her dad in the hospital, Bea is forced to live with her exceedingly kind grandmother in a three-story brownstone building in Brooklyn. It’s not exactly your typical Harry Potter-lives-in-a-cupboard story, but it’s still sad. (Fiona Shaw, most famous for playing Harry Potter’s nefarious Aunt Petunia, actually plays the benevolent grandmother in this film.)
Wandering around her new expansive surroundings, Bea comes across a mysterious neighbor in the form of Ryan Reynolds. He happens to be harboring a multitude of IFs in his apartment, all looking to attach themselves to kids that need them. Their creators, (the kids they belong to) have all forgotten about them. Thus, the IF’s are forced to wander the world in hopes of being recognized.
Bea, being 12, refuses the call to action at first. After all, she’s not a kid. Why would she need an imaginary friend? Well, my friends, this is where the spoiler-free section comes to an end.
Steve Carell shows off his voice talents once again as the lovable IF Blue.
Spoilers Ahead
The voice cast of the imaginary friends is a veritable who’s-who of Hollywood. Just to name a select few, we have Steve Carell, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Awkwafina, Emily Blunt, George Clooney, Bradley Cooper, Blake Lively, Matt Damon, and many other recognizable names. There’s even a credit for Brad Pitt playing an invisible IF with no lines. This is undoubtedly a nod to when Pitt played an extremely short, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo in Deadpool 2. The Ryan Reynolds/Brad Pitt saga continues!
Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Ryan Reynolds, Cailey Fleming, and Emily Blunt.
There are a lot of moving parts in this movie, and I think the audience suffers for it. It’s not quite clear who this movie is for. It seems a bit too deep for kids, but a bit too light for legitimate adult fare. The marketing of this film was deceiving, as one would think this would be chock full of zany imaginary characters getting up to a bunch of wild antics. This isn’t the case at all. The IFs only appear in about 30% of the movie. The rest is about a young girl transitioning into womanhood and finding that her inner child is worth hanging onto.
So Bea and Ryan Reynolds’ task is to take all of these IFs, and find them matches with kids without IFs. There are several references to them being a “match-making service”, and a Tinder app for matching imaginary friends with their real-life counterparts is one of the more funny and clever aspects of the film.
Like any decent story, Bea and Reynolds run into a few obstacles, overcome them, and triumph! But wait! There’s a twist! Ryan Reynolds has been Bea’s original imaginary friend all along! It’s a fairly easy to see twist, but it works. Plus, it negates Reynolds’ character being a creepy pedo stalker that likes to break into kids’ rooms at night and hang out exclusively with imaginary characters and a 12-year old girl. That bit was not sitting well with me for the first two and a half acts of the film.
All’s well that ends well, however. Dad makes it out of his operation successfully, Bea reunites with her IF, and all the other IFs find thier now-adult creators. It’s a nice story, and one that the whole family can enjoy.
Bea embracing the fact that the IFs are real.
5 Quick Hits
If her leading performance is any indication here, Cailey Fleming is poised to become an absolute superstar! At only 16 years old, she managed to convey a wide range of emotions that most actors would be envious of.
Awkwafina must have a clause in her contract where she has to have a part in every film that has animation in it. Her distinctive voice has become almost ubiquitous. I’m not complaining. She’s great! Just pointing that out.
I’m sure Fiona Shaw (the grandmother) was chomping at the bit to get this role. Usually in movies like this, the guardian character is either abusive or absent. Considering she played Aunt Petunia (Harry Potter) so well, it was refreshing to see her play a similar family role, but be the exact opposite person. Shaw had an amazing monologue and even a solo dance scene in this film!
Child actor Alan Kim (Minari) damn near stole the show here. His turn as a relentlessly optimistic kid who breaks just about all of his limbs is so charming… I could barely contain myself.
The late great Louis Gussett Jr. plays an old, wise teddy bear that serves as the mentor to our protagonist in this film. There’s a touching tribute to Gussett (who died earlier this year) in the mid-credits scene.
