I’ve often referred to Twitter as “my newspaper”. It is a statement of fact and also shame-based self-deprecation. The very concept of Twitter is to take a variety of complex ideas and compresses them into 280-character bites that lack any necessary nuance (there’s a reason it’s the preferred communications tool of Donald Trump, and why he was forcibly removed from it). Perhaps that is why the tweet thread of Aziah “Zola” King became such a phenomenon. In one single thread, Zola shared 148 tweets detailing an outrageous trip to Florida involving prostitution, attempted murder and a white girl named Jessica. The thread blew up, going viral in a way that threads this long seldom do. And that’s the point: on Twitter, where brevity is the design, someone managed to tell a full, three-act story with suspense, intrigue and a comic timing that usually only comes from professionals.

A movie based on a Twitter thread seems rather novel, for now. The chances of it becoming a regular thing seems slim, though the copycat nature of Hollywood means you should never say never. What makes Zola so special is how director Janicza Bravo combines absurd comedy with an understanding of the cadence of a Twitter story. What is funny in a movie and what is funny in a tweet isn’t exactly the same thing, but Bravo is able to combine them beautifully, trusting the story’s beats while still keeping its uniquely tech-oriented origin. This is a hysterically funny movie. One that has a Coen-esque touch of farce, while embracing the sex work intimacy of Sean Baker and the neon sleaze of the Safdie brothers. I bring up these allusions not to call Zola in any way derivative, but to applaud the seamless way it melds various styles into such an original film.

Zola is played by Taylour Paige, in a performance that is part comic center and part straight man. The white girl – her name here is changed to Stefani – is played by Riley Keough, whose performance is end-to-end ludicrous. Stefani’s personality and vocal modulations are unapologetically ripped from Black culture, something that she uses to endear herself to all the Black people she meets. The two are introduced when Stefani sits at a table in the Detroit restaurant where Zola waitresses. When Stefani learns that Zola is a part-time stripper, she invites her to come dancing in a nearby club to make some money. Appreciative of the tip and bonding over their mutual profession, Zola takes to the sweet (if grating) Stefani. They become quick friends, which prompts Stefani to invite her again to another dancing opportunity – this one is in Florida.

Zola‘s first act is a lot of place-setting, an extended staging of anticipation of what is to come. It’s when things begin to go wrong in Florida that the film really starts to take off. The two are joined Derrek (Nicholas Braun), Stefani’s dim string bean of a boyfriend, whose life goal is to become a star of viral videos on Instagram. There is also Stefani’s “roommate” (Colman Domingo), whose name is unknown and whose style and body language immediately communicates the stark reality: he is Stefani’s pimp. After an adequate night in a strip club in Tampa, Zola finds herself entangled in the trip’s real goal: Stefani’s various prostitution sessions. The bait-and-switch reveal leaves Zola incredulous, but she decides to help Stefani, refiguring her online page and getting her more money than her pimp ever dreamed of. One good turn deserves another, but Zola’s generosity ends up having serious consequences.

Things spiral from there. Zola finds herself a side-saddle participant in Stefani’s various exploits, watching as a parade of unseemly johns come to get what they paid for. In a not-so-surprising turn, Stefani’s pimp turns out to be violent and paranoid, barely allowing Stefani to keep any of the money she makes (in one of many funny quirks, Domingo’s pimp explodes in an unexpected African accent when his rage is at it’s peak, an accent that goes otherwise unheard). In an entertaining B plot, a lonely Derrek decides to befriend a Tampa local named Dion (an as-always terrific Jason Mitchell). This supposedly benign act only ends up adding to the preposterous events of the weekend. Bravo keeps the balance right throughout between the laughs and the suspense, upping the ante with each subsequent set piece until Zola reaches it comedy zenith.

This was originally meant to be directed by James Franco (*extreme eye roll*), until the details of his sexual misconduct got the project shelved. It’s no small thing that the film’s producers (among them, indie Hollywood legend Christine Vachon) allowed a Black woman to direct this film, empowering Bravo to show her uncanny talent for fostering comic moments out of genuinely disturbing events. The script, written by Bravo and award-winning playwright Jeremy O. Harris, has a particularly modern feel. Its attachment to Twitter and phone app culture in general is shown authentically without feeling anthropological. Like the Twitter thread that came before it, the script keeps a forward momentum, propelled by the ever-growing absurdity of its characters.

The bleeding edge satire works (it is probably a testament to Keough’s performance that her character puts such a strain on the ears), but it is a fully conceptualized story as well. As Zola, Taylour Paige is a terrific mix of deadpan delivery, internalized fear, and these-fucking-white-people glares. Zola’s defiance against increased danger in the form of Stefani’s pimp (among others) has less to do with courage and more to do with self-preservation, and Paige perfectly channels those complex emotions often just with glances. Of course, the tweet-cited voice over narration helps a lot. Aziah King’s Twitter thread gets source material credit here, an underrated detail in the film’s production, especially an industry that makes intellectual theft such common practice. It’s another example of the generosity and empathy that lies at the heart of this film; for its filmmakers, actors and especially its characters.

 

Directed by Janicza Bravo