“Man, you got shit cooking up every time I see you,” a friend of Khalid (Derrick B. Harden) says in “The Black Sea,” unaware that he won’t be seeing him again any time soon. It may depend on whether you share the same sense of adventure as Khalid has to buy in immediately to the latest from “Skate Kitchen” director Crystal Moselle, co-directed with her lead actor Harden, or only slowly surrender to its many charms, but a curious Facebook message is enough to get Khalid to quit his job at a Brooklyn cafe and fly halfway across the world to Bulgaria where a sickly woman awaits, promising him money for the trip and then some after she herself has been told by a fortune teller that her pain could be relieved by the touch of a Black man.
“The Black Sea” wouldn’t work if it came by its fish-out-of-water premise cynically, but skin color quickly becomes an afterthought as Khalid appears in desperate need of a change of scenery and can only be so upset when he arrives in Bulgaria to find that the woman he intended to meet there has passed. His immediate idea to sleep inside one of the many docked boats along the pier ends with a missing bag and no passport to return home, yet he can’t help but enjoy himself a bit when sitting on the rocks as the tide comes in and even admires the ants marching along the ground for having some feeling of purpose that he doesn’t. Subscribing to the notion that wherever you go, there you are, Moselle and Harden spend little time dwelling on the past when Khalid has to start making decisions for his immediate survival and when everything about the situation seems like a mixed blessing, it only makes sense that Ina (Irmena Chichikova), the woman who could help him get back to New York as a travel agent – i.e., a working laptop and access to Travelocity – is the one who could lead him to stay, sympathetically serving him up a slice of the local toast known as prinzesi with cheese and getting him nostalgic for the days when his mom prepared him something similar back home.
Aesthetically, Moselle’s work has always had a loose, playful energy to it and it couldn’t be more appropriate as Khalid relaxes into a new life where there may be pressure to find work but he has to let go of any expectations he may have of himself, simply reacting to what’s happening in front of him. A slippery and seductive sitar-heavy score from Charles Moselle accompanies scenes of Khalid getting to know the community that embraces him as someone new in a life of routine just as much as they start to win him over, and filled with sly humor about how everyone in town is somehow connected to one another, it only seems like a matter of time before Khalid has that deep a bond. But nothing ever feels forced and as refreshing as it is to wander around Bulgaria alongside Khalid, the feeling of possibility in his own life is what’s enthralling, particularly when the ex-pat brings up the increasing lack of opportunity in his own country to actually build something. Moselle and Harden recognizes that can include confidence, which the film exudes itself, and while it may take time for Khalid to leave his mark with something tangible, “The Black Sea” leaves a deep impression simply by observing him starting to believe in himself.
“The Black Sea” will screen again at SXSW on March 11th at 3:15 pm at Alamo Lamar 6 and March 12th at Violet Crown Cinema 1 at 5:45 pm and Violet Crown Cinema 3 at 6:15 pm.