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Essay: Director Barry Jenkins’s 2016 Oscar winning film, Moonlight

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  • Published: 16 April 2022*
  • Last Modified: 18 September 2024
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  • Words: 1,804 (approx)
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Director Barry Jenkins’s 2016 Oscar winning film, Moonlight, tells the story of a neglected African-American boy named Chiron, who was raised in the crime-ridden Liberty City section of late 1980s Miami. Adapted from a play by DePaul University alumnus Tarell McCraney, the main protagonist encounters homophobia, questions of masculinity, and confusion about his identity as this film traces Chiron’s journey to self-acceptance. Accounts of queer identity among people of color are rarely depicted in mainstream cinema, yet the multifaceted characters portrayed in this picture allow the audience to connect and bond with these flawed archetypes who are shaped by their circumstances rather than by choice alone. Though questions of his sexuality are the undercurrent from which the movie is shaped, ultimately, Chiron’s evolution from alienation to acceptance is profoundly universal.

As the story takes on the conventional narrative of hostility toward marginalized people, Jenkins employs the traditional three-act play structure of setup, confrontation, and resolution that has been used since Shakespeare. However an inventive deviation on this arrangement emphasizes the fluidity of both our lead’s physical and emotional identity by having different actors portraying him at varying time periods designed around a distinct artifice: Little – an unfavorable nickname given by schoolmates insinuating vulnerability, Chiron – his birth name from the inattentive birth mother whose personal struggles amplify his oppression, and finally Black – a label from longest and most intimate friend Kevin that also honors his departed mentor Juan. Each identity is influenced by forces outside himself.

The movie opens on a sun-drenched corner of Liberty City as the camera pans in a circular motion building up a sense of frenetic energy before Juan moves into frame with a cool bravado that comes from the confidence of knowing his environment. Often stereotyped, his outward demeanor epitomizes the strong, inexpressive masculine man. This is immediately contrasted with a chaotically shaking camera in the following scene where Little escapes into a crack den from his bullies yelling to “get his gay ass” (Moonlight, 2016). Juxtaposing from what we know about Juan, he comes to empathize with the young, world-weary protagonist as both he and his girlfriend Teresa’s home became a sanctuary for this helpless little boy to progress. Places like The Stonewall Inn or Compton’s Cafeteria were meeting places for marginalized individuals to be open and explore parts of themselves they could not normally out in the general populous and in an analogous fashion, Juan and Teresa’s home acted in that manner for Little.

Two major points of isolation for Little were both his home and school life. The only scene in which he seems to be most enjoying school was in dance class. Dance, like many artistic endeavors are generally not viewed as masculine in our society. This is in contrast to the game of knock-down all the neighborhood boys are playing. I believe it is similar to a game we used to play as youths ironically called smear the queer. It’s awful to look back on it now, but for good or bad, we are the products of our environment. Wide camera shots of the scene indicate Little looking on from the periphery with great trepidation, thus emphasizing his otherness. It is not until his schoolmate Kevin comes up afterward does Little open up. After some goading about what is expected for a proper masculine identity from Kevin, they start to play wrestle. The editing of this scene displays an intimate moment between these two young boys that ends with Little looking almost euphoric. Though still not sexually mature, it was in this moment that Little was allowed to explore his curiosities in a benign manner. In addition, young Kevin’s attitude about expressing masculinity broke down to acting either hard or soft. Disregarding the Freudian phallic nature of that dichotomy, the act of displaying hardness was seen as essential by Kevin to fit in with his peers. Little did not willfully go along with that notion of firmness or chasing after girls, and in the following chapter, he seems to suffer harassment because of it.

With no known father or siblings, Little has only his crack-abusing mother to rely on. Even when confronted by Juan, a crack dealer himself, she bares her insecurities about her son in the way he walks. As so many queer youths attempt to conceal their otherness, many times it appears everybody around them already know without having it verbalized. Similar to how the subjects in the documentary Growing Up Trans knew they were different before reaching sexual maturity, so do many gay adolescent boys and girls. This section ends with Little, Juan, and Teresa sitting around the table as he is comfortable enough to finally ask some tough questions. In this tense scene, he asks his surrogate parents what a faggot is and if he is one. Juan is able to answer compassionately and without judgment, once again juxtaposing from how a man is supposed to stereotypically act. Little begins to understand, but not yet accept his sexuality. Moreover, questions can be raised about a movie with gay themes from this period failing to discuss the AIDS epidemic, but because our protagonist is so young it would only compound the story in other directions, so I can see why it was not addressed. Semi-autobiographically, both Barry Jenkins and Tarell McCraney’s mothers struggled with drug abuse and became HIV positive. Unfortunately, McCraney’s mother succumbed to AIDS related illnesses just before he originally wrote the play of which the movie is based on (Keegan, 2016).

During the second act, Chiron’s life is spiraling downward as his father figure is abruptly murdered off-screen. This naturally leads to familiar feelings of abandonment as both his school and home life continue to deteriorate. Even though he still spends time with his surrogate “mother Teresa” it just reminds him of losing the one man who loved him unconditionally, while his biological mother is falling further into crack addiction. His one childhood friend Kevin, who is also played by different actors throughout to parallel his journey towards maturity, acts as a typical macho young man talking up his supposed female sexual conquests which Chiron insincerely relates to. Their friendship leads to the climax of the movie as they share a brief sexual encounter under a moonlit beach. Before that occurs, they open up about their feelings and how much they cry, an act pigeonholed as emasculating in our culture. Kevin is still concealing his true self by saying he does not cry, but his eyes and body language says otherwise. The intimacy shared was something Chiron held onto as the last pillar of human kindness, which soon again will lead to abandonment. Kevin, still subjecting himself to societal norms, is pressured into fighting Chiron by Terrel, a bully that has been known to question Chiron’s sexuality. As much as Kevin pleads for Chiron to stay down, he keeps getting up showing that his toughness within outmatches all the other boys’ bravado. This final betrayal by his first love sets Chiron off into a direction that leads to revenge on Terrel and incarceration. Just as he was abandoned by Juan in the first section, the loss of Kevin informs a new identity is taking hold as the men in his life impact Chiron’s external character.

In the final portion, Chiron leaves Miami for Atlanta and takes on his newest persona, Black. This latest identity is a manufactured facade of impenetrable, hyper-masculinity echoing back to his mentor Juan, who was also derisively called Blue. Furthermore, Kevin, his only sexual partner, is the one that originally coined the nickname. He may have fled his past physically, but not psychologically. Black begins to finally make his way toward emotional maturity when visiting his mother who is now sober, paradoxically as Black is now a drug dealer, mirroring Juan. With their conflict ultimately resolved, Black goes to reunite with Kevin.

The diner scene is one rarely shared in cinema as two adult black male one-time lovers attempt to resolve their past grievances. Both characters have been shaped by the world they grew up in. Like Black, Kevin has spent time in jail and actually has a child of his own. Gone is the childish bluster as Kevin has reached a level of sensibility that comes with finding one’s self. The simplicity of the diner setting also lends itself to an air of freedom when attempting to bond. Also, time slows compared to much of the movie as we see Kevin making a chef’s special for Black with great attention and love. Black eats his specially prepared meal with a shared bottle of wine as if this was a conventionally romantic date. The scene peaks when Kevin admits to thinking about Black when he plays Hello Stranger by Barbara Lewis on the jukebox. Neither can verbalize their true feelings at that moment, so Kevin allows the lyrics to speak for him.

“Hello, stranger

It seems so good to see you back again

How long has it been?

It seems like a mighty long time” (Lewis, 1963)

Each look across the booth in the eye, man-to-man, as their body language once again says more than their own words could. One may expect rap music to be playing in this setting, as this Barbara Lewis song is anachronistic for the time and place, but that makes the scene so powerful. Similar to the drag community that met at Compton Cafeteria, the cruel outside influences are not meant to be foisted upon the clientele. Each are lost in their thoughts without societal pressures condemning their authentic feelings.

Back at Kevin’s apartment, Black finally opens up about their shared experience at the beach a decade prior. All pretense is gone, and he exposes his true feelings with his one romantic partner. The shot of himself and Kevin hugging is meant to convey that performative masculinity intrinsic in our society is ultimately destructive to the individual. Soaked in the tinted moonlight, the movie ends with Little looking back at the camera smiling and letting us know he will be okay. This is a callback to his mentor Juan who was called Blue by an old woman but chose to disregard her notions and forged his identity. Chiron finally understand the lesson from Juan, “At some point, you gotta decide for yourself who you gonna be. Can’t let nobody make that decision for you” (Moonlight, 2016).

Work Cited

Keegan, Rebecca. Filmmaker Barry Jenkins’ Own Rough Bio Helped Shape ‘Moonlight’. Ajc, Los Angeles Times, 28 Sept. 2016, www.ajc.com/entertainment/movies/filmmaker-barry-jenkins-own-rough-bio-helped-shape-moonlight/Y4NHu84tbHDPwO7JrxJlKJ/.

Lewis, B. Hello Stranger. Moonlight Soundtrack, Lakeshore Records, 2016.

Moonlight. Directed by Barry Jenkins, performances by Mahershala Ali, Naomie Harris, Trevante Rhodes, Ashton Sanders, and Alex Hibbert, and Janelle Monet. A24, 2016.

2019-3-18-1552952896

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