Moonlight, directed by Barry Jenkins

The leads are gorgeous, supporting cast is strong, but If Beale Street mostly a stiff.

I liked most of Beale Street--parts of it, in no small measure because of the score, are beautiful--but didn't care for the detour to Puerto Rico, and thought the last 20 minutes in general meandered.

Just saw a commercial for Beale Street that used "Killing Me Softly." Did I miss that in the film? Not a song I've ever cared for, and it wouldn't be the first commercial that used a song not in the actual film, but if it is, I didn't notice it at all.

I dont remember it either,
Clem.

agree completely alfred

with....?

your review!
I also thought it was a stiff. Too tied to the source material - the structure is exactly the same as the book and its discursive tendencies don't work when copied exactly to film. the book is able to meander, in the film it's just fragmented and rudderless

Of note!

This is a thing we did 🙏🏿

MOONLIGHT
8 x 11 in. / 224 pages
- Forward by Frank Ocean
- Essay by Hilton Als
- Academy Award Acceptance speeches

pic.twitter.com/ubbRSjMShS

— Barry Jenkins (@BarryJenkins) September 26, 2019

by the end, i had forgotten my annoyance at how chiron stumbled across the most sensitive, supportive, and lovely drug dealer ever because i am so tired of protagonists that announce their struggles by simply not speaking when spoken to. at least the movie is self-aware enough to make a joke of it in act 3.

there's something evocative and vivid in the filmmaking, and some charming moments in the 3rd act, but as hard as jenkins tries to make you forget it, it's a play and not a very good one.

chiron stumbled across the most sensitive, supportive, and lovely drug dealer ever

Actually I thought it was more complicated than that, and this was one of the best things about the movie -- that Kevin says to him in the first part of the movie that he can't be soft in the world, he has to show he's hard, and that resonates with what he learnes from Juan, but does it work for Juan? No, Juan's visibly hard and so he gets killed and leaves Teresa alone. When Chiron finally shows he's hard and beats down Tyrell with a chair, that's what sends him to prison, that's what sends him down the path of helpless repetition of inadequate male role model and leaves him a sexless, locked-down fuckup who can't even either rage at or forgive his mother, he's just hard and stuck. And it all starts with Juan.

xyzzz otm: "I like that quietitude about it."