Tayarisha Poe’s debut feature film “Selah and 

the Spades” is an ancient, familiar story. It’s about 

legacy and vice. It’s about power — how you get it, 

how you keep it, how you lose it. It’s stylish and 

Shakespearean, featuring crime kingpins, bootleg 

rackets, snitches and plenty of stitches … but also 

prom, senior pranks and AP bio tests.

As it so happens, “Selah and the Spades” is a 

mob movie wearing the clothes of your standard 

high school drama. 

Set in Haldswell School for Boarding and Day 

Students — the sort of magical private school that 

only exists on TV — the titular character Selah 

Summers (Lovie Simone, “Share”) is queen bee, 

a matriarch of matriarchs. A straight-A student, 

the cheerleading captain, possessor of wicked 

style and, of course, the ice-blooded, iron-fisted 

leader of a drug-dealing racket, Selah’s got a lot on 

her plate in addition to the looming approach of 

graduation. 

As an expository narrator tells the audience at 

the beginning of the film, Selah’s drug ring, the 

Spades, peddles in “booze, pills, powders, fun,” 

but is just one among many factions that facilitate 

illicit activities for the Haldswell student body. 

The Sea provides cheating services, the Skins 

regulate gambling, the Bobbys throw parties and 

the Prefects act as middlemen with the school 

administration. If Selah doesn’t find a successor 

soon, her drug empire is wont to be absorbed by 

one of these competing factions, and her legacy 

hangs in the balance.

Remember, 
this 

is 
high 
school. 
It’s 

Shakespearean, 
but 

weirdly Shakespearen, 

like 
“Bring 
It 
On” 

meets 
“Macbeth” 

meets “The Godfather” 

meets an angstier Wes 

Anderson. It’s not like 

HBO’s “Euphoria,” a 

show 
that 
similarly 

tried 
to 
represent 

the underbelly of the 

American teen’s life, complete with an unblinking 

vision of drug-addled and sex-infused strife 

and recklessness. No, it’s an altogether different 

brand, one that’s engorged with self-seriousness 

and overdramatic to an almost laughable degree. 

Cliques have mottos and sign actual, written 

treaties with one another. Posters on the wall 

scream “FACTIONS are GANGS; GANGS are 

against SCHOOL POLICY.” In response to 

the cancellation of prom, one mousy character 

stammers, “This is insane that they’re doing 

this. I mean, this is America!” to which another 

character soberly replies, “No, it’s not America 

when you’re on school property … it’s the United 

States of Haldswell.”

I’d be lying if I didn’t say it was all a bit 

ridiculous at times. I’d also be remiss to deny the 

film’s flair and earnestness. Scenes are delicately 

shot, costumes are fun and stylish, and the prop 

department 
clearly 

had a blast designing 

the 
opulent 
campus 

and ornamented dorm 

rooms 
of 
Haldswell 

Boarding. 
Simone’s 

performance 
as 

Selah is gentle and 

yet 
commanding, 

and 
performances 

by 
her 
right-hand-

man Maxxie (Jharrel 

Jerome, “Moonlight”) 

and 
protégé 
Paloma 

(Celeste O’Connor, “Wetlands”) are equally 

believable and ooze that hallmark teenage 

commixture of angst and bravado. 

The Machiavellianism and shadow politics of 

a prep school underworld are ultimately a hard 

sell. They come off a little like that high school 

production of “Romeo and Juliet” you saw while 

visiting home last summer, where the Capulets 

and Montagues are competing coffee shops, 

Mercutio has a skateboard and Tybalt rocks a 

letterman jacket. It’s a little uneven, a bit over-

indulgent, but a decent enough way to kill a few 

hours. And considering the nature of the world at 

the moment, plenty of us have hours in — yes, I’m 

going to say it — spades.

Tuesday, April 21, 2020 — 6
Arts
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

AMAZON STUDIOS

JACOB LUSK
Daily Arts Writer

‘Selah’ is a weirdly Shakespearean high school drama

FILM REVIEW

Before her debut, Rina Sawayama was the kind 

of low-key singer you’d come across on Spotify and 

think, Holy shit, she is going to have a career. Her 

first EP, RINA, remains one of the best musical 

projects of 2017. She burst onto the scene with a 

fresh pop sound that was in-your-face, uniquely 

undiluted and over-ornate. Her writing was 

breathtaking, her voice was sublime and her beats 

were out of this world — thanks to her producer, 

Clarence Clarity. He brought the best out of her, 

and she brought the best out of him: a musical 

match made in heaven. There was no reason 

SAWAYAMA couldn’t continue the rich aesthetic 

of RINA and still make for an unparalleled debut. 

But Rina would not settle for doing what was 

working. Her sound was destined to be built upon 

further. On SAWAYAMA, it transcends.

It was clear SAWAYAMA would be something 

different from “STFU!,” the first left hook Rina 

threw back in November. The ripping nu metal 

track was followed in January by left hook 

number two, “Comme Des Garçons (Like the 

Boys),” a sleek and sexy dance pop banger that was 

built for the club. They weren’t just different from 

Rina’s music of 2017 and 2018 — they couldn’t be 

more different from each other. Where “STFU!” 

was a simultaneously hilarious, frightening and 

enraging attack on microaggressions, “Comme 

Des Garçons” put toxic masculinity through a 

woodchipper, shredded beneath a beefy bassline 

and thumping kicks. By the time “XS” dropped — 

a critique of overconsumption — I was certain the 

rest of SAWAYAMA would consist of Rina leaning 

into her talent for satire.

I couldn’t have been more wrong. Literally 

every other track on the album is deeply personal. 

Vulnerability is nothing new to Rina, yet 

SAWAYAMA is especially intimate, a lens into 

the intricacies of Rina’s identity. Album opener 

“Dynasty” is a regretful reflection on Rina’s 

troubled childhood and her struggle to cope with 

her parents’ resentful relationship. Rina lays 

her heart bare, singing “Mother and father, you 

gave me life / I nearly gave it away for the sake 

of my sanity.” She continues to meditate on the 

role family plays in her identity throughout the 

entire record; titling it after her surname is no 

coincidence.

SAWAYAMA is the most Rina has ever grappled 

with her cultural identity over the microphone. 

She was born in Japan and moved to London 

with her family when she was five years old. On 

“Akasaka Sad,” written during a visit to Akasaka, 

Tokyo, Rina expresses feeling like she doesn’t 

belong in London or Tokyo, resonating with her 

parents’ own struggles as Japanese immigrants 

in London. Later, on “Bad Friend,” Rina sets 

the stage in Tokyo again, this time reminiscing 

about singing karaoke with a close friend during a 

fleeting summer getaway, a friend she would later 

fall out with. Rina revisits this Tokyo hotel setting 

a third time on “Tokyo Love Hotel,” a reference 

to Japanese hotels where rooms are paid by the 

hour, allowing couples a private space for sex. 

Here she compares foreigners’ blind idolization of 

Japan with a stay in a love hotel, leaving with no 

true appreciation or understanding of Japanese 

culture. But at the end of each chorus she sings, 

“I guess this is just another song ’bout Tokyo,” 

acknowledging that she herself is guilty of the 

same thing when she escapes to Tokyo in “Akasaka 

Sad” and “Bad Friend.” Her complicity in “using” 

Japan complicates her torn identity, and her wry 

self-awareness compels empathy.

Rina eschews delicacy for candor, both lyrically 

and sonically. “Paradisin’” is blatantly bubblegum 

pop, hyper-exciting, sparkly and glitzy. It’s the 

opening theme to a SAWAYAMA sitcom, or the 

soundtrack to an ’80s film montage of teen girls 

sneaking out to go shopping at the mall. Rina 

unabashedly delights in the trouble she got into 

as a teenager, the juicy electropop tune embracing 

overjoyed rebellion against her single mother. 

Rina sings, “Then you threaten to send me to / 

Boarding school for the seventh time / I know we 

can’t afford that, so I’m fine.” These lines are a gut 

punch, revealing layers of malice and immaturity 

in teenage Rina’s attitude toward her mother 

beneath the song’s bubblegum exterior. 

Two thematic cornerstones of the album are 

“Love Me 4 Me” and “Chosen Family.” The first 

track deals with Rina’s struggle to love herself. The 

second is about the solace Rina has found in her 

chosen family, emphasizing an important form 

of interpersonal support for many queer people 

whose relationships with their biological families 

become strained or broken (Rina came out as 

pansexual in 2018). Unfortunately, both songs lack 

the lyrical depth of the rest of the album. For such 

heart-wrenching topics, they’re addressed with 

unremarkable simplicity; reading the title of each 

track is enough to understand the point of each 

song. For the most part, neither track is strong 

enough instrumentally or interesting enough 

structurally to warrant such simplicity. Despite 

this, “Chosen Family” is a compelling climax to 

the album’s overarching theme of family.

The final track, “Snakeskin,” is a feverish closer, 

terrifying yet beautiful, solemn yet heartracing. 

The metaphor of a snakeskin handbag, used and 

abused and destroyed, is one of the most cryptic. 

But at the end, it returns to Rina relating to her 

mother. As Rina tells Apple Music, she samples 

Beethoven’s “Sonata Pathétique” because it is the 

only song she can remember her mom playing on 

the piano, and a quiet sample of her mother’s own 

voice says in Japanese, “I’ve realized that now I 

want to see who I want to see, do what I want to do, 

be who I want to be.” Recalling Rina’s reference to 

her father’s infidelity on “Dynasty,” her mother as 

the snakeskin — used and abused and destroyed 

— is an intriguing thought with which to close the 

album.

SAWAYAMA rolls a staggering number of 

concepts into the complicated intersection of 

Rina’s identity in its 43-minute runtime. Toxic 

masculinity, 
parental 
rebellion, 
adolescent 

depression, microaggressions, broken households 

— Rina does each of them justice through her 

music. Interspersed within the record’s family-

centric narrative is self-aware criticism of 

overconsumption and cultural objectification. 

Lyrically, there’s so much to unpack in this album 

that it’s almost overwhelming. By the time I’ve 

truly understood the depth of SAWAYAMA, the 

once little-known singer will be filling stadiums.

ALBUM REVIEW
‘SAWAYAMA’ lies at the crossing of identity and family

DYLAN YONO
Daily Arts Writer

DIRTY HIT

Selah and the 

Spades

Amazon Studios

Now Streaming

SAWAYAMA

Rina Sawayama

Dirty Hit

