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While many of us like to imagine high school like a John Hughes movie—or even a wild teen rom-com—it’s not always that light and uplifting. Instead, it’s often more like gang warfare with formal dances. And writer/director Tayarisha Poe sets out to capture the more sinister side of high school in the Amazon original drama Selah and the Spades.
Selah and the Spades navigates the final semester of senior year with Selah Summers (Lovie Simone), the queen bee of Haldwell, a prestigious boarding school in Pennsylvania. Selah is the head of the Spades, the most powerful of the school’s five factions—the one that supplies the students’ vices: booze, pills, whatever else they may need. While her demanding mother may control her life, Selah controls the school with an iron fist. But with graduation approaching, it’s time to find a successor—and she’s got her eye on ambitious sophomore Paloma (Celeste O’Connor).
This prep school drama is far from the typical teen movie. Selah isn’t boy crazy or gossipy. She doesn’t giggle with her girlfriends during lunch. She’s cold and calculating and ruthless, ruling the school—even the other factions—like the typical crime boss, with help from Paloma and her sidekick, Maxxie (Jharrel Jerome). She has no interest in dating because it’s nothing but a distraction. And she doesn’t really have girlfriends. She just has the Spades and her spirit squad—both of whom obey her every command.
All of this gives the film a heavier tone than the kind of high school movies that you may be used to. While there are a couple of somewhat stereotypical characters (like theater queen Bobby, played by Ana Mulvoy Ten), there’s nothing silly about it. Selah is all business, and it seems appropriate that the film is given a more sophisticated style in everything from lighting and color palette to dialogue and pacing. It’s definitely an artistic drama—but that means that it may not have the same appeal as a more lighthearted film.
Meanwhile, though Selah’s story is an intriguing one, it doesn’t really come together in a way that’s compelling. The tension and mystery slowly build through the film, adding in the occasional conflict—but when it comes to an end, it seems like it holds back instead of following the drama through to the end.
This definitely isn’t Sixteen Candles or High School Musical. It’s dark and edgy and stylish. But the slower pace and anticlimactic conclusion keep Selah and the Spades from being a powerful, memorable teen drama.
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