By guest columnist paoloarag0na.
I’d been catching up on all the big films that were released in the tail end of 2016 and had put off seeing Moonlight until a late screening this past Saturday evening.
(Minor spoilers follow.)
Wow — wish I’d watched this so much sooner. Few films leave me feeling floored in the theater, and especially in the days after (felt the same after watching Her and much of Wong Kar-wai’s work). I took a long moment to sit and reflect as the end credits rolled and people began to exit the theater. I’d teared up at multiple points in the film, but the release the character of Chiron, and you as the viewer, feel at the film’s conclusion was utterly palpable. I spent that moment of stillness to quietly weep — as did a few of my fellow viewers.
Powerfully evocative and pulsing with an ethereal, dream-like beauty in its cinematography and score/soundtrack — Moonlight achieves in telling a masterfully crafted and universal narrative in human identity, and embracing the whole of who you are.
Bravo, Barry Jenkins and cast — particularly Mahershala Ali and the three actors portraying Chiron. Incredible that the actors never met one another, yet could still capture the same character so convincingly and consistently. Makes one respect Barry Jenkins’ skill as a director that much more to pull such performances from his actors.
Paoloarag0na is a culture junkie, copywriter, dancer, and martial artist in NYC. Find more at instagram and youtube.