“Sub Eleven Seconds” is why Black people should do Black things – as in prepare our own art, even if it doesn’t make sense to you (the masses), so don’t try to make sense of Black culture. Bafic’s 2022 Sundance Film Fest short film submission of the infamous Sha’Carri Richardson in Sub Eleven Seconds was both touching and empowering. Director Bafic truly captured Sha’Carri’s essence in just under 30 minutes. The track star, unlike any other, can truly attest to what stardom is really like. One day you receive all the praise, the next you’re vilified for being just who you are.
The short is described as a rumination on time, loss, and hope, a poetic imagining of Sha’Carri Richardson’s quest as a young track and field athlete to achieve her dream of qualifying for the Olympic Games.
One of the late, great Virgil Abloh’s works, Sub Eleven Seconds is also directed by a Black man, and is truly a testament of why we should handle our stories. This is evident when they showed the precious but unbeknownst shots of Sha’Carri fixing her hair, always patting it down at the roots, something that every Black girl would do after sweating out her ‘do. The hugs shared with her grandmother who took care of her most of her life were something oh so familiar to a lot of us in the diaspora. Then there was the shock of the commentator after learning that Sha’Carri just ran the best race of her life despite losing her biological mother only a week before. Sha’Carri is every Black woman pursuing her dreams or even simply doing what must be done to stay afloat.
The aftershock (i.e. what transpired after her Olympic trials) of the movie is the true dichotomy of life for Black women–having enough confidence in yourself to meet your goals, yet being perceived as too cocky to pacify people enough to believe you belong there after a small setback. The realization of the hours of work it takes to be the best at something that only literally lasts seconds could be a life lesson to what we all are trying to pursue. Acknowledgment of our life’s purpose may be what the film is trying to convey. Either way, it was a heartfelt look into the life of an athlete’s fears, motivations and desires.
CREDITS
- Director: Bafic
- Producer: Chloe Sultan, Mahfuz Sultan, Virgil Abloh
- Executive Producer: Virgil Abloh
- Director of Photography: Ben Kutchins
- Editor: Harry Yoon, ACE
- Original Score: Asma Maroof, Daniel Pineda
- Run time: 24 min
MEET THE ARTIST
Bafic is an artist based on planet Earth. Among multiple other formats, his work is frequently conveyed via moving image.
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