Sasha Nathwani is a UK-based director of award-winning short films, of Iranian and Indian heritage, stepping up here to his feature debut. It opens the Generation strandin Berlin and is a sweet-natured, heartfelt and earnestly acted film; a little precious maybe, but saved from emo-sentimentalism by irreverent humour and a wittily self-aware final image of his leading actor’s face.
Last Swim is the story of Ziba, played by Deba Hekmat, an Iranian-British teen who has just stormed her A-levels and landed a place at University College London to read astrophysics; this is despite a certain attitude on the part of her interviewer who shows, if not microaggression, then microcondescension, pointedly asking if any other members of Ziba’s family ever studied this subject. Ziba has got intricately detailed plans for her and her 6th form mates to celebrate on results day; these are Tara (Lydia Fleming), Shea (Solly McLeod) and Merf (Jay Lycurgo).
An opening sequence seems to suggest that Ziba has issues with ADHD and substance abuse. The truth is darker and more difficult, and the idea of this being the first day of her adult life becomes much more complicated. What makes it more complicated still is that Ziba is annoyed to learn they are to be joined on this special all-day partying event by someone that she doesn’t know: Malcolm (Denzel Baidoo) a guy a year ahead of them at school, now in the youth training programme of a London football club. Malcolm appears to accept with shrugging good grace everyone joking that he is on the verge of mega-riches. But Ziba is to be the witness of a desperately humiliating moment in Malcolm’s life and a shocking, intimate moment between him and his mum. The film shows that there is a bond between her and Malcolm, somehow closer and more meaningful than the one she has with her longstanding mates and their relationship is flowering into something else, deepened perhaps by the mutual knowledge that the future is not something they can rely on.
Nathwani gets a headlong rush of energy from his zesty young cast, as they roam all over London – firstly in Shea’s horribly uncool 80s car, then on bikes, then via train. They go to Portobello to get a sandwich from a shop that Ziba has capriciously decided is the city’s best, then up to Hampstead Heath and Primrose Hill. And just as the film looks like settling into the placid tropes and cliches of the coming-of-age film, we are blindsided by a startling event; it’s not clear quite what we’re supposed to think about this new turn, other than to realise that real life really can be as unscripted and chaotic and painful as this. Last Swim looks slightly callow sometimes, but forthright and likable and Hekmat’s performance has delicacy and intelligence.
• Last Swim screened at the Berlin film festival.
