Voices of Culture section<\/a>, a non-competitive showcase of 40 short films created by people of African descent, includes Mini Me a South Florida-based, 18-minute Southern Gothic drama.<\/p>\nMini Me, written and directed by South Florida filmmaker Allison Oddman, follows a Jamaican-American mother and daughter chasing an open casting call for a hit TV show, as they navigate unspoken grief during a turbulent Florida hurricane season. <\/p>\n
\u201c\u200aYou know, when you grieve, you’re keeping your loved ones alive in a way,\u201d Oddman told WLRN. \u201cAnd it’s only in not voicing their names and their memories when they’re truly dead.\u201d<\/p>\n
Oddman\u2019s said her film is a period piece set in the mid-2000s, and a \u200acore of the story is inspired by her personal journey with grief. \u201cWhen I was 12, I lost a family member who was very much like a mother to me in every way,” she said. <\/p>\n
And like her main character, Nova, who went silent after her aunt died, Oddman went completely silent when her cousin passed away.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of what inspired this film was just my upbringing in South Florida. \u200aI was raised by four Black Jamaican women,\u201d she added. \u201c\u200aAnd a lot of those sensibilities were about life, death and the afterlife, and this idea that the spirit never dies, and they’re constantly communicating with us.\u201d<\/p>\n
IF YOU GO:\u00a0
Girl Dad
Date: Saturday, May 30
TIME: 1:55 PM
LOCATION: Miami Beach Convention Center and again on Sunday, May 31 from 3:00\u20135:00 PM at the Historic Lyric Theater as part of ABFF Community Day.<\/p>\n
Mini Me\u00a0
Date: Saturday, May 30, 2026
Time: 10:30 AM \u2013 12:20 PM
Location: Miami Beach Convention Center \u2013 Theater #2 (Screening Room #2)
Program Block: Voices of Culture Block #6<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 30th American Black Film Festival (ABFF) is underway in Miami Beach, with Community Day set to spotlight…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":289344,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[123,125,124],"class_list":["post-289343","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami","tag-miami","tag-miami-headlines","tag-miami-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289343","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=289343"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289343\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/289344"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=289343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=289343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=289343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Mini](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1780087629_812_.jpeg\"\/)
<\/p>\n