NECKTIE YOUTH
DIRECTOR: Sibs Shongwe-La Mer
CAST: Sibs Shongwe-La Mer, Bonko Cosmo Khoza, Colleen Balchin, Kamegolo Moloi, Emma Tollman, Kelly Bates
CLASSIFICATION: 16 DLPS
RUNNING TIME: 90 minutes
RATING: 3 stars (out of 5)
Theresa Smith
BLEAK and wanna-be nihilistic, Necktie Youth is a depressing snap-shot of Joburg rich kids. Shot in black and white, the film softens the grimy haunts of inner city Joburg and turns the suburbs into a haunting Cartier-Bresson postcard. The careful framing and beautiful lighting makes each scene look weighty, but the flibbertigibbets the film follows carry no weight other than their parents’ money.
Loosely framed as if it was a documentary investigating the effect of their friend’s suicide, it follows a group of friends on their daily business. It flits back and forth in time, starting with Emily’s (Bates) suicide, and then gives us each of the friends trying to articulate how they feel about her actions. They all struggle to use their words, mostly, it seems, because they are unsure about what they are supposed to be feeling. Though they spend all this time together they are disconnected from each other. They just come across as feckless and suicidal, living in a wonderful bubble of entitlement, drugs, parties, booze and sex.
The camera mostly concentrates on September (Shongwe-La Mer) and best friend Jabz (Khoza), showing us how they intersect with spoilt Tali (Giovanna Winetzki) and her sister Rafi (Ricci-Lee Kalish), drug-dealing Matty (Michael Marshall), Tanya (Balchin) and others.
Parents are shadowy figures being argued with on the other end of the phone, good only for providing money and emotional pressure.The friends bond over whether parents will even notice that the good wine has been replaced by plonk and where the next party will be and who gets to bonk whom.
The film goes around and around in an aimless fashion as each person is introduced, spiralling into Nowheresville as September and Jabs score more drugs and drink more alcohol, cruising around in Daddy’s car until the petrol runs out.
Every now and then someone throws in an overtly political statement into the conversation, talking about how messed up the country is by Zuma’s corruption.
This snapshot of these kids searching for identity in booze and drugs is very particular to this Sandton crowd – who really exist – but what was the point? Then again, do films really have to have a raison d’être or leave you with a bounce in your step?
The director shows us a lost generation of kids who grew up with privilege provided by parents who fought hard for their kids to be aimless – just another facet of who we are in our black and white rainbow nation.
If you liked Kids or uMalusi, you will like this.