African Aya is a beautiful 30-year-old woman. When her fiancée cheats on her the day before her wedding, Aya gives up on getting married and goes to Guanghzou, known as China’s Chocolate City, and starts working in a very stylish tea shop.
Aya’s boss Cai teaches her the secret of tea art, the tea ceremony, tea preparation and tasting. They go to tea fields together. The tea ceremony is a sacred ceremony in China. The friendship between them turns into love.
There are many Africans in China, Chinese, English, French, African languages are spoken; Borders are erased, cultures and tastes mix. Sissako decided to shoot this story after meeting an African couple who ran a restaurant called The Perfumed Hill. Chocolate City has become a place frequented by everyone because of the shops selling all kinds of products. As the scars of the past continue, the romantic drama Black Tea depicts the discovery of the other/stranger and a period in which emotions are experienced with enthusiasm.
Will Aya and Cai’s love continue due to their troubled past and the prejudices of others? The director shows Aya adapting without explanation. Silence, serenity, unspoken words, unspoken confessions, emotional moments and classical narration make the film valuable. Master Sissako finds that the current problem is the fear of the other, the stranger, and that it is useful to meet different cultures. Now it is Africa and Asia’s turn. According to him, Europe has consciously left Africa off the agenda. Now is the time for solidarity between Africa and Asia. Dreams, fantasies. Black Tea is Nina Simone’s song Feeling Good, lyrics of a new day, a new life, a story of hope, expectation and love for a world in change.
This time, instead of poetic and political tales, the creative master deals with the changes and impasses that come with globalization, with a refined aesthetic. In the timeless place Chocolate City, people leave their differences behind. Sissako is not naive, he defends a completely different vision of globalization with this story of hope. In the face of power and violence, the characters are silent, wounded, defeated, but full of hope; harmony is salvation. 10 years after Timbuktu, Black Tea, directed by Abderrahmane Sissako and starring Nina Melo, Han Chang, Ke-Xi Wu, Michael Chang, was released today.
THE GAME OF LOVE AND LIFE
Luca Guadagnino, director of My Name is Love, Call Me by Your Name, Bones and Everything, turns to the world of tennis in the movie Competition. We watch what is happening in professional tennis through the three-way relationship of three friends/lovers named Tashi, Art and Patrick.
In screenwriter Justin Kuritzkes’ free adaptation of the life story of the famous tennis champion Tashi Duncan, the ambitious provincial Tashi begins to want everything as she climbs the stairs, her aim is to become stronger. After meeting Stanford University students Art and Patrick, he wants to join the university’s tennis team, saying, “It’s not all about swinging the ball and racket.”
Two friends who are fans of Tashi compete fiercely to get her, and the love triangle becomes increasingly complicated. For Tashi, success means power; is to control one’s life, the lives of others, and one’s appearance. Managing Art is easier for Tashi, who says, “I take very good care of my white children.”
Her ex-girlfriend’s daughter’s father, Patrick, is a conceited, sarcastic type. The director reflects relationships, love, power, jealousy, competition, desire and sensuality through a trio with an extraordinary aesthetic expression. The music of Trent Reznor and Atticus Reznor and the costumes of famous designer Jonathan Anderson are successful. The performances of Zendaya, Mike Faist, Josh O’Connor are impressive.
