THE FIRST TIME I HEARD IT spoken was in elementary school, by two older boys. One of them said, “iyay illway eetmay ouyay atyay ott’sscay ousehay.” My interest was piqued by the strange words. I could not tell if the boys were related or from a different country. Since they were in an upper grade, I did not venture closer to ask them what they were speaking. For the next few days, I would think about that encounter and imagine they were spies or at least the sons of spies; my imagination was already active from a very early age. As luck would have it, I happened to be in the school library when the two boys were there, sitting together at a table. I pretended to look for a book at a bookcase that was nearest to them. After pulling out, looking at then pushing a couple of books back onto the shelf, one of the boys said something in that unusual language. I noticed every word ended in the “ay’ sound; there had to be some type of code going on. Suddenly an idea popped into my head. I grabbed one of the books I had looked at and brought it to the librarian who was sitting nearby. Leaning over, so I could whisper, I asked her if she knew what language the two boys had been speaking. Being kind, she in turn leaned closer to me and said they were speaking Pig Latin. She then pointed at the set of encyclopedias lined up along the window sill and told me to look it up, if I was interested.      MY IMAGINATION CAUGHT FIRE AS I read about this code language of Pig Latin. I thought it would be so cool to teach my friends so we could talk freely without anyone knowing what we were talking about. The thought of passing notes in class, written in Pig Latin, would allow us to speak freely without anyone understanding what we were talking about if they grabbed the note away from one of us. I began practicing at home by translating books into Pig Latin. Once I felt confident I could easily hold a conversation in the language, I taught a couple of my friends. It did not take long before we started conversing in this new, secret code. The first time I spoke it to a friend in class, the student sitting in front of me turned around and answered the question I was asking my friend. I was devastated. How in the world did she know what I was saying? It never occurred to me that other students would be just as interested as me. The only way I could get around from letting students know what I was thinking and saying, would be to do what the set of twins did in this biographical drama.      IDENTICAL TWINS WITH VIVID IMAGINATIONS CREATE an alternative world where they are the only residents. There was no longer a need to speak to anyone in the real world. With Letitia Wright (Black Panther franchise, Death on the Nile) as June Gibbons, Tamara Lawrence (Boxing Day, Kindred) as Jennifer Gibbons, Nadine Marshall (Paddington 2, The Smoking Room-TV) as Gloria, Treva Etienne (Black Hawk Down, Acts of Desperation) as Aubrey and Michael Smiley (Free Fire, Kill List) as Tim Thomas; this film based on a true story was fascinating to watch at first. However, while the story unfolded I had this gnawing feeling that something was missing—the backstory. I think the script would have been powerful if the writers had spent time showing the history prior to the girls’ introduction to the movie viewers. I thought the acting was excellent from the two leads and the story was certainly attention grabbing; but I always had the question in my mind, “How did this happen?” I felt like an outsider and speaking of being an outsider, for those of you who do not know Pig Latin, the older boy I heard in school was saying, “I will meet you at Scott’s house.”

2 ½ stars