Jonathan is out of place in his middle-class London drama school. Pigeon-holed for a role as a Black hoodlum in a classmate’s play and coaxed by his teacher to take the typecast part, Jonathan decides to demonstrate to his peers the prejudices, during a class role play exercise.

Winner of a Grand Jury Prize at SXSW, Play It Safe is an ingeniously tense interrogation of unconscious racism in seemingly liberal spaces. Shot on 16mm, the film’s audacious finale stamps a visceral exclamation point on a remarkable calling card for director Mitch Kalisa and actor Jonathan Ajayi.