Ben and Sarah Grady worked together self-publishing children’s books, but she was considered the talented one. Det. Reyes only sees her $750K life insurance policy, but his sister Gloria worries her brother is spiraling into a deep depression.
Following a random social media comment to the dark web, Grady ill-advisedly buys a truly self-published—as in handwritten—tome purportedly explaining how humans can fly. It also comes with benefit of the hippy dippy guru’s personal coaching sessions. Initially, Grady is still sufficiently grounded to be suspicious of “Mealworm,” but his bizarre training regime starts satisfying something inside him.
Weirdly, it also sort of fits the advice offered by Wendy, a widow herself and the only member of Sarah’s writing’s circle who keeps checking in. She says find something crazy and stick to it. His flying ambitions certainly qualify.
This film probably would have been a disaster in any hands other than that of Mendoza. As a filmmaker, he has a record of versatility, having helmed the musical Fruit Fly and the disturbingly surreal horror film, I Am a Ghost. He also has a talent for handling heightened emotional content with a deft touch, which serves Human Flight well.
In fact, it was rather required, because Jesse Orenshein’s screenplay has considerable emotional and eccentric excesses. There are times when it tries to be either too whimsical or too sentimental, but Mendoza always brings it back to the emotional center. Indeed, the relationships between the Gradys and the widow and the widower are incredibly resonant—and ultimately much more interesting than whether or not Mealworm will get his padawan airborne.
