My Summary:
Seen:
88/97
My list:
16/25
As we keep trucking towards the Top 3, I wanted to highlight another one of my choices that won't make it, but this is one that I initially thought would get in, even if it was on the back-end, but well... it's 2016's
Moonlight.
Here is my review from Letterboxd, which I'm a bit proud of...
------
"At some point, you gotta decide for yourself who you're going to be. Can't let nobody make that decision for you."
"A film about homosexuality" or "a coming-of-age story". Both labels might be valid to define and describe what Barry Jenkins second film is. But it would be a disservice and a sacrifice of the richness of this film, because
Moonlight is so much more. And that's precisely the idea that lies at the core of the film; like the film, the characters that live in it (and by default, we) are more than just labels. Our richness as human beings goes beyond the niches that society and circumstances might try to fit us in, and that's something that we have to figure out, sometimes painfully, as we grow up. Who am I? Who are we? "Who is you, man?"
Moonlight follows the live of Chiron, a poor, black kid growing up in Miami, through three different stages in his life: childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood. As he grows up, bullied and rejected, he explores his identity, through his race, his sexuality, and his relationship with others, most notably his mother (Naomie Harris). Through all those stages, Chiron is assigned different labels and names, whether it's his given name, a nickname, or an insult. The names he goes by are an attempt by him or those around him to define who he is. The above quote comes from Juan (Mahershala Ali), a drug dealer who ends up becoming a father figure to Chiron, as he remembers how an old woman wanted to label him when he was a kid: "In moonlight, black boys look blue... you're blue". But he wasn't having any of that, and he tries to instill that same sense of independent thinking and self-discovery on Chiron.
Chiron is black, poor, and confused. He's angry, depressed, and scared. He was in jail, became a drug dealer. But to try to box his characters into any of those slots, means sacrificing what his character, and what we as humans, are and can bring to this world. Prejudices and discrimination allow us to dismiss others simply based on single traits, while closing the door on what those lives really are. Black, white, brown, straight, gay, rich, poor, tall, short, big, little.
Moonlight shows us that we are more than just the color of our skin, a sexual orientation, or a particular social status.
In the same way, to try to box
Moonlight into a particular slot is to neuter its potential and ambition. A film simple in its complexity, and complex in its simplicity; just like Chiron, or you or me. A.O. Scott described the film as "a poem written in light, music and vivid human faces". That's how beautiful it is, but it's up to you to see it and experience it. Can't let nobody make that decision for you.
------
EDIT: Forgot to add that
Moonlight is one of 3 films on my list that I've only seen once. Bringing it up since we talked about it earlier in the thread, but these three are cases where the films really, really left an impression in me. I will probably bring up the other two tonight.