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Title:
Director:
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Length:
Starring:
Jump Tomorrow (2001) PG
Joel Hopkins
Drama
89 min approx
James Wilby, Hippolyte Giradot,
Tunde Adebimpe
J ump T omorrow is a film about lonely outsiders
escaping the unromantic and awkward realities
of their lives, in order to follow a new spontaneous
direction of their own shaping.
George (Tunde Adebimpe) is an awkward and shy
Nigerian about to take part in an arranged marriage to
a childhood friend. While waiting for his intended in
an Airport he happens to meet a loud and extrovert
Frenchman Gerard (Hippolyte Girardot). This chance
happening marks a new beginning for them both, as
they go in search of a new adventure, and a new love
for George, in the form of Latin beauty Alicia (Natalia
Verbeke) who he meets at a party, and is inspired to
pursue her across the country.
Far from being only a stock road movie or romance,
Joel Hopkins’s subtle and careful direction is flattered
by Tunde Adebimpe’s natural performance. For
Hopkins’s debut feature the naï ve representation of
love is sensitively captured by the acting of Adebimpe.
The film has a spontaneity and freshness that was
help ed by Hopkins brave choice of Adebimpe, an
animation student who he happened to meet by
chance, for the lead role, who at the time was not a
professional actor but a clay maker.
George is presented as an uncomfortable outsider, on
the road from one indiscernible place to another. This
created a sense of the realities of all of the main
characters obvious displacement, both of place and of
emotion. George’s character is freed from his
obligations by the character played by Girardot who
allows him to literally follow his heart.
The film uses humour and the quirkiness of its
characters to delicately present very different
individuals searching for a sense of belonging, be that
of a person or a place, along with an understanding of
the personal liberty to live your own life, and maybe
choose to J ump T omorrow instead of today.
Belinda Okuya