This has certainly been a weird year for imaginary friends. Between the creepy imaginary friend in imaginary, to a realistic imaginary friend in The imaginary, and now to If, which is an acronym for Imaginary Friend, where a girl (Kaley Fleming) explores her grief by finding lost imaginary friends and trying to reunite them with new or reunited owners. All three of these films were released in just a little over a three month span. What If If was the best?
John Krasinski walked away from the Quiet Place prequel to direct this film, so it must be good. the supporting cast, which includes Krasinski as Fleming’s father, also represents a wide array of talent, from Ryan Reynolds, Steve Carell, and Phoebe Waller Bridge, to an appearance by the late Louis Gossett Jr.
Fleming’s lead character is someone we meet at a point where she’s still rather fresh from watching her mother die, to find out that her dad needs to spend some time in the hospital. It is implied he has some heart condition, but Krasinski plays this so oddly, he might be in imaginary hell, and we wouldn’t know. He wears a shirt with a broken heart on it at one point, which feels way too on the nose. But, he can’t take care of his daughter for a while, so she goes to live with her Grandmother she hasn’t seen for a while. it’s here that she appears to see life sized imaginary friends, living in one of the apartments upstairs, where a neighbor (Reynolds) is working to try and find all these lost friends a home. Since she has nothing else to do, she offfers her services since she can see them.
The best thing Krasinski did here was cast Kaley Fleming, who has been forced to deal with a lot of mature topics rather early in her career through appearances on the Walking Dead, and Creepshow. Fleming is playing a lot younger here, as most 17 year old girls wouldn’t be expected to carry a narrative about imaginary friends, but her age also excuses the fact that her grandmother seems very nonplussed about her granddaughter roaming the city on her own.
The stars here, the ones people might show up for, all do fine jobs, but it is hard to say anything here is memorable. I can’t imagine seeing a lifetime achievement award for Reynolds, carell, or the others with such strong work outside this film featuring this. It feels odd that Krasinski chose this, since he’s the least interesting thing about it. I think Krasinski probably should have taken a step back, focused on just directing, so he could figure out what message he was trying to send with the father.
it culminates in a somewhat predictable ending, but it was a mostly pleasant time. It isn’t a film I’ll necessarily have on my top list, but it is also nowhere near the bottom. For the most part, Krasinski proves once again that he’s a pretty solid director, but he owes Kaley Fleming a lot more credit than she’s probably getting for being an emotional anchor in all of this.
What I Look For In Audio Description?: Credits. But seriously, I sat through to the end, and no one was credited. There is the hint of a post-credits scene, but it is just a nice tribute to Louis Gossett Jr. The biggest thing here is understanding the creative design of all these imaginary friends. Not just the main ones, but the lesser screentime ones as well. I’m sure it is a feast for the eyes, and it should also be an auditory feast that sparks imagination. This is aimed at families, so choosing the right narrator that feels comfortable for children is a huge plus. There’s some fun location based work, which helps. Most of it is in the city, but some choice moments are more interesting than others. There’s also an interesting mechanic that the film uses when a human perhaps starts to recognize an imaginary friend, and describing that is important to draw us in.
What It Does: Really, most of that. This was a pretty strong audio description track. i liked it a lot. I felt like I knew what the imaginary friends looked like, I got the mechanics behind their interacting with people, the city was fairly well described, and I loved the choice of narrator without knowing for sure who it was.
Final Thoughts: It’s the best of the three imaginary friend movies this year, with a winning performance from Fleming, in a fairly well directed movie by Krasinski, that leads to a feel good ending you might see coming. The biggest downfall here is that I didn’t think Krasinski was actually good in his own movie, which is a shame because he’s proven himself dramatically and comedically, so there’s no reason for him to feel so awkward. Truthfully, it feels like someone backed out at the last minute, and he stepped in so they didn’t have to push filming.
Final Grade: B