If Anything Happens I Love You – Netflix Short Film Review
From Will McCormack and Michael Govier, If Anything Happens I Love You (IAHILY) is a tenderly intimate animated short with immense bravery and pain etched into its fabric. A minimalist production in its sketched visuals but its emotional power could not be more immense.
As the face of the streaming revolution, Netflix has received criticism from many for being a signal of the death of cinema. A fear of the unknown is understandable but the company’s insistence of funding projects like The Irishman, a film Scorcese had been trying to make in Hollywood for some time, along with other projects whose contributors turned to Netflix for the opportunity to release, means it offers a real chance for filmmakers to make the film they want to. They have utter faith in the people and projects they choose and proffer them creative control. It’s a director’s dream. The result of this faith in mass distributing films which are challenging and bold is something as profoundly impacting as If Anything Happens I Love You.
With the premise, the filmmakers showed true boldness in their confident approach toward America’s issue of school shootings with a tender tale and documentation of a parents’ emotional journey as they attempt to manage the ensuing grief and momentous mourning phase. The pain of the narrative contrasts with a typi
cally beautiful piece of animation which currently seems to be regulation for animated releases. A sharply etched 2D sketchbook art style aesthetic with emphasis placed on characters rather than locations breathes the film a harsh edge only pencil marks can bring. The visuals of the opening minutes are noticeably barren of setting designs, leaving an abundance of empty space which brilliantly magnifies the solitude and separation the loss has wedged between the couple. A 12 minute duration empty of dialogue places an extra layer of reliance on the artful visuals. The silence speaks more than dialogue ever could.
Colour comes at a premium with the abject lives reflected in the greying sketches only disrupted by the looming black silhouettes,
representing the emotions of the parents. The silhouettes (with a ghoulish Scream-like quality) are yearning for companionship, embracing each other and the memories of their child in the most emotionally pivotal scenes, while the parents split and fracture. This exemplary silently revealing storytelling tool is just one example of the abundant creativity.
Once a miserable atmosphere has been imprinted both on screen and wherever you are watching from, the narrative shifts away from the grieving process to the child’s death. This most precarious subject is handled with tactility, measured distance and sensitivity.
Along with recounting the horrific event, context is applied to the fragments of pained reminders that the parents found around the house. All this does is add another heaving weight of emotion, building on the already well-established anguish and compassion between myself and these parents.
Approaching grief with this much compassion seems easy, but IAHILY floods the story with the omnipresent idea of the grief, those you lose and the memories that come with that person never leave you but bind you and there is an aching beauty in that.
And that is the best description of IAHILY. Painful beauty. No scene reflects this more than the most tormenting image of the unwitting parents waving their child off to school in what is a sickeningly intelligently animated scene.
In many cases the commendable intentions in broaching such a sensitive societal issue would earn a nod of respect from myself, irrespective of the quality of the film. Thankfully, that isn’t necessary for what should be in a right and true world an awards contender. It is quite special -and something cinema excels in- to give me, someone with no experience of this immeasurable trauma, a window, even if only a slight peek into an experience as powerful as this.
Deeply affecting and immensely understanding, If Anything Happens I Love You is a pained journey of brilliant storytelling that only film could exhibit. The 2D animation is glorious and piercing with a sharp appointed understanding of grief which is empathetic and familiar. So, do yourself a favour. Watch it. Please.
