By Tshi Malatji
Black Burns Fast is a coming-of-age romance set in a South African all-girls religious boarding school, where scholarship student Luthando Mthimkhulu studies all-day and avoids breaking rules, but secretly wants to explore her sexuality and live a more exciting school life.
With lighthearted point-of-view scenes, quick camera dollies, playful graphic effects and caricatured characters, the tone of the film is comedic in the vein of chick-flick-esque young adult high school films. There are dreamlike sequences and cut-outs, which reinforce its not-so-serious fun atmosphere.
The school is comedically religious, with a nun teaching sex education and most of the other teachers being just as out-of-reality. The students are typical, fulfilling the usual gender roles: boys who scroll social media to rate girls and girls who do makeovers. Lesbianism is called ‘experimenting’ and discussing politics is discouraged. Underneath the witty, sometimes exaggerated, chain of events is an explicit commentary about sexuality and a character construction of Luthando’s acceptance of her identity.
The new girl, Ayanda Khumalo is not-so-ordinary. She likes anime, smokes weed, and talks openly about sex. Unsurprisingly, Luthando, who has a history of crushing on girls in the school, sees Ayanda’s arrival as an opportunity to change her ‘boring’ identity.
Ayanda fits in with the popular girls, has exuberant confidence and a rebellious nature. While there are tensions between Ayanda and Luthando’s personalities, the film does some work to bring the two together, exploring both of their characters in turn.
Yet, the excessive tone of the film often undermines its ability to create a longing bond between Ayanda and Luthando, which may also be a deliberate message about the lacklustreness of teenage romance in the first place. Together with a quick progression of events and over-focus on only Luthando’s thoughts, the film misses out on its ability to pack a stronger romance.
The film unwinds steadily with obstacles for Luthando’s growth, where the supporting cast are portrayed as positive vehicles for her self-exploration. She rather quickly is forced into inner conflict with her nervous avoidance and supposed boringness.
Luthando’s narrative is about the exploration of identity, the fragility of a character in becoming and the ease through which a person can descend from their innocence. Luthando does not just come-of-age; she devolves and evolves as a person first.
There is much to appreciate about coming-of-age stories which subvert the innocent-girl cliche and Black Burns Fast understands how to create and deconstruct its lead character as an expose on a self-destructive and reconstructive protagonist. Yet, Luthando is also just a high school girl. Her errors are not moral failures. They are part of the “experimentation” and exploration of being a growing person in a suppressed environment. There is an inner dialogue involved in sexuality, identity and becoming. Most of all, it’s very easy to lose one’s way during this process. After all, Black burns very fast.
Catch the film at DIFF: https://ccadiff.ukzn.ac.za/diff46/black-burns-fast/
Screening Schedule:
18 Jul 19:45 Suncoast 6
26 Jul 17:00 Watercrest 1
1 Aug 20:00 The Labia
1 Aug 20:00 The Bioscope
This review emanates from the Talent Press programme, an initiative of Talents Durban in collaboration with the Durban FilmMart Institute and FIPRESCI. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author (Tshi Malatji) and cannot be considered as constituting an official position of the organisers.
