Sixty high school students filed into the small theater, chattering excitedly. As the lights dimmed, their voices quieted. The Refocus High School Shorts program was about to begin.
Among the short films presented were a movie called Dona Beatriz Ñsîmba Vita, inspired by the story of a Congolese leader but set in contemporary Brazil; Amma Ki Katha, which explored the past and present of India through mythology; and We Are Not Alone, a film about the illusion of The American Dream in modern society.’
We Are Not Alone, directed by Adebukola Bodunrin, takes place in a world much like our own, with one key difference: there are aliens. A young Nigerian immigrant, played by Tobi Omodehinde, is transfixed by the ideas of these aliens taking her away, and is committed to persuading the unfamiliar creatures to take her with them when they leave Earth.
Along with a newfound friend, played by Katie Malia, she succeeds in creating a connection with the aliens. However, they leave without taking her. Tobi Omodehinde’s character ends the movie upset, but with a different worldview.
“The main character is a Nigerian immigrant. I was born in Nigeria, so it was very much a cultural influence,” Bodunrin said. “The perspective is very much like an immigrant story. The main thesis of the film is the false promise of the American Dream, or what it’s like to come to a country and not have it quite live up to your expectations.”
Though Director Bodunrin added plenty of elements of her own, the film is based off of a short comic by Ezra Claytan Daniels, a cartoonist originally from Sioux City, Iowa.
“The idea [of the comic] is the metaphor of pinning all your hopes and dreams on this object that you can’t identify,” Claytan Daniels said. “For me, it’s the idea of pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, going to college, getting a job, working hard, doing the nine to five, and you’ll be guaranteed like everything you want. That’s just simply not the case. [In the film], it’s the idea that if they master this skill set, then this thing in the sky will give them all of their all their hopes and dreams.”
On the more technical side of things, the short film made use of leftover film from Euphoria to create visual patterns to match the breathing techniques the characters employ in the movie.
“I really loved, loved, loved post production. I figured out a way to use a hobby laser plate machine to, like, etch into the film to create the patterns. That was like a trial and error process of, like, trying all these scratches onto the film,” Bodunrin said.
The film had its world premiere at South by Southwest last March, and was also submitted to the Fantasia Film Festival, and other smaller sci-fi and African themed film festivals.
