“Maybe the best single quote on the Black Experience in America is in Ralph Ellison's 1952 masterwork, Invisible Man. The titular character makes the dizzying observation that "black is and black ain't," a contradiction central to the madness of race in America. It's real. But it's bullshit. People only see black when you want to be human, but as soon as you're being beat, shot, and shit on for your blackness, suddenly it's all "race doesn't matter," and "we're all one." We've taken a biological lie and forced it into a centuries-deep social truth. The mere effort of both maintaining and denying this charade has made America maniacal and Blackness insane.
This contradiction drives Famuyiwa, like many black storytellers, to undertake a number of strategies that shouldn't be revolutionary, but are. He uses the cinematic language of 90s indie teen comedies like Rushmore and Go! to tell a story in a setting where moviegoers more likely expect to see Boyz n the Hood. Here he captures the "black ain't" side of the Ellison quote. If Max Fischer can be charming, resourceful, and arrogant, so can Malcolm. If Ronna and Claire can have a slick, madcap adolescent drug caper, so can Jib and Diggy. Race and class do not trump the universally understood panicked weightlessness of a fading American adolescence.” (more…)