@ZOLA
****
Director: Janicza Bravo
Screenwriters: Janicza Bravo and Jeremy O. Harris, based on the tweets by A’Ziah King and the article “Zola Tells All: The Real Story Behind the Greatest Stripper Saga Ever Tweeted” by David Kushner.
Principal cast:
Taylour Paige
Riley Keough
Colman Domingo
Nicholas Braun
Ari’el Stachel
Nasir Rahim
Country: USA
Classification: MA15+
Runtime: 86 mins.
Australian release date: 18 November 2021.
“Y’all wanna hear a story about why me and this bitch here fell out? It's kinda long but full of suspense.” Thus begins @Zola, a movie about the underbelly of The Beast (The Beast in this instance being the USA) and the people who live their hard-scrabble lives there. As Zola might have said, ‘it ain’t pretty but it true,’ because this unusual film is based on a series of 148 tweets sent out by the real Zola, A'Ziah King, in 2015. The story (and the film) begins in October 2015, when King started tweeting about a weekend road-trip she took to Florida which quickly morphed into a journey to hell. Despite the sordid details she was relating, her tweets were often laced with humour and they started a twitter storm of interest. When she was subsequently interviewed for an article in Rolling Stone, the story of her exploits crossed over from the digital realm into the wider world and became a media sensation.
African-American Zola (Taylour Paige) was working as a waitress at Hooters and pole-dancing part-time in Detroit when she met Stefani (Riley Keough), a white dancer/stripper, and the two quickly became pals, so when Stefani rang to say she was heading down to Tampa to work at a strip club where you could earn five grand in a weekend, Zola was ready to join her. When Stefani arrived to pick her up, however, Zola found that there were two men in the car as well: X (Colman Domingo), Stefani’s mysterious Nigerian ‘roommate’, and Derrek (Succession’s Nicholas Braun), her insecure boyfriend. Undeterred, Zola set off for a weekend of “hoeism” and fun times, hoping to return with a swag of cash. Needless to say, things didn’t go as planned and before the weekend was over things turned very, very nasty but, regardless, Zola kept tweeting.
@Zola is in a similar vein to Harmony Korine’s Spring Breakers and Sean Baker’s Tangerine and, like those films, it has a streak of coal-black humour running through it. Billed as a comedy-thriller, it’s also got a lot to say, albeit obliquely, about the treatment of women at the hands of men. None of the males in this story are decent people; they’re all about using the women around them for their own gain, even dim-witted Derrek, who uses Stefani emotionally, not financially. Stefani is her own worst enemy but, luckily for her, Zola is street-smart and has her wits about her, as evidenced by her tweets. Both Paige and Keough are extraordinary and embody their characters and Paige sure can dance. Be warned though, they both speak Black patois and Stefani, in particular, sometimes needs subtitles to understand her slang/shorthand/trash way of talking. Note, too, both women and, indeed, the entire cast, liberally use the ‘n’ word. British composer/musician Mica Levi has produced a stunning score and soundtrack and Aussie cinematographer Ari Wegner has done some very inventive work using a 16mm. camera (yes, @Zola was actually shot on film, a rarity these days).
This is not a film for every taste. It’s a pretty shocking look at Trump’s America (it was shot in 2018) and even though the real Stefani was a willing partner to the sleazy goings-on, in a very real way she was being sex-trafficked. You will admire the performances, have a bit of a laugh and enjoy the music but, probably more than anything else, come away from @Zola with a somewhat bitter taste in your mouth.
Screenwriters: Janicza Bravo and Jeremy O. Harris, based on the tweets by A’Ziah King and the article “Zola Tells All: The Real Story Behind the Greatest Stripper Saga Ever Tweeted” by David Kushner.
Principal cast:
Taylour Paige
Riley Keough
Colman Domingo
Nicholas Braun
Ari’el Stachel
Nasir Rahim
Country: USA
Classification: MA15+
Runtime: 86 mins.
Australian release date: 18 November 2021.
“Y’all wanna hear a story about why me and this bitch here fell out? It's kinda long but full of suspense.” Thus begins @Zola, a movie about the underbelly of The Beast (The Beast in this instance being the USA) and the people who live their hard-scrabble lives there. As Zola might have said, ‘it ain’t pretty but it true,’ because this unusual film is based on a series of 148 tweets sent out by the real Zola, A'Ziah King, in 2015. The story (and the film) begins in October 2015, when King started tweeting about a weekend road-trip she took to Florida which quickly morphed into a journey to hell. Despite the sordid details she was relating, her tweets were often laced with humour and they started a twitter storm of interest. When she was subsequently interviewed for an article in Rolling Stone, the story of her exploits crossed over from the digital realm into the wider world and became a media sensation.
African-American Zola (Taylour Paige) was working as a waitress at Hooters and pole-dancing part-time in Detroit when she met Stefani (Riley Keough), a white dancer/stripper, and the two quickly became pals, so when Stefani rang to say she was heading down to Tampa to work at a strip club where you could earn five grand in a weekend, Zola was ready to join her. When Stefani arrived to pick her up, however, Zola found that there were two men in the car as well: X (Colman Domingo), Stefani’s mysterious Nigerian ‘roommate’, and Derrek (Succession’s Nicholas Braun), her insecure boyfriend. Undeterred, Zola set off for a weekend of “hoeism” and fun times, hoping to return with a swag of cash. Needless to say, things didn’t go as planned and before the weekend was over things turned very, very nasty but, regardless, Zola kept tweeting.
@Zola is in a similar vein to Harmony Korine’s Spring Breakers and Sean Baker’s Tangerine and, like those films, it has a streak of coal-black humour running through it. Billed as a comedy-thriller, it’s also got a lot to say, albeit obliquely, about the treatment of women at the hands of men. None of the males in this story are decent people; they’re all about using the women around them for their own gain, even dim-witted Derrek, who uses Stefani emotionally, not financially. Stefani is her own worst enemy but, luckily for her, Zola is street-smart and has her wits about her, as evidenced by her tweets. Both Paige and Keough are extraordinary and embody their characters and Paige sure can dance. Be warned though, they both speak Black patois and Stefani, in particular, sometimes needs subtitles to understand her slang/shorthand/trash way of talking. Note, too, both women and, indeed, the entire cast, liberally use the ‘n’ word. British composer/musician Mica Levi has produced a stunning score and soundtrack and Aussie cinematographer Ari Wegner has done some very inventive work using a 16mm. camera (yes, @Zola was actually shot on film, a rarity these days).
This is not a film for every taste. It’s a pretty shocking look at Trump’s America (it was shot in 2018) and even though the real Stefani was a willing partner to the sleazy goings-on, in a very real way she was being sex-trafficked. You will admire the performances, have a bit of a laugh and enjoy the music but, probably more than anything else, come away from @Zola with a somewhat bitter taste in your mouth.
