Tropic Sprocket / Moonlight

By Ian Brockway

Barry Jenkins’s “Moonlight” is a film about growing up that is larger than its content. It is expansive and open, epic with a perspective that rivals Richard Linklater’s “Boyhood”. More to the point, it is edgy and daring, telling its story of the life of a boy maturing into a man with the tones of a thriller.

There is plenty to be nervous about. A black youngster Chiron (Alex Hibbert) lives in Liberty City. He always has to watch his back. He lives with his promiscuous mother (Naomie Harris) who is addicted to crack. Chiron goes to school but the kids bully him because of his calmness and passivity. While hiding, he meets Juan (Mahershala Ali) a kind-hearted drug dealer who feeds the frightened boy.

Chiron won’t talk but he warms up to Juan’s vivacious wife, Teresa (Janelle Monáe).  Animosity builds between Chiron and his mother over her drug use and Juan spends more time with the boy. Soon the boy is older. His one friend is Kevin (Jharrel Jerome), a boy who told him not to be “soft” and who gives the air of being a ladies’ man. One night on the beach, Kevin initiates a sexual encounter.

Chiron remains guarded and shy, though secretly elated. The next day, a school bully (Patrick Decille) picks Chiron out and forces Kevin to hit him three times in the face. Chiron packs his face in ice and the next day retaliates.

The film is excellent in showing how kids think and act. It stands alone in giving the texture of Chiron’s life, in all of its pyrotechnics and paranoia. At times, the images crackle in surprise and at others the camera closes in revealing sharp edges and confined spaces with the flavor of German Expressionism. Inanimate objects are close up, over-large and confrontational. A mere glass of orange juice is sinister.

As a boy Chiron seems a scared pup. Later he is a boxer, then an adult gangster without an enveloping coat. A spontaneous reunion and the frying of plantains could be the harbinger of a violent comeuppance or a lover’s kiss.

The sound of the ocean brings want and aversion in equal measure. The episodes highlight the weird wonder of one man’s life as well as his apprehension.

One is made to take in all of Chiron, a boy, a teenager, a man, non-judgmentally. Nothing is forced. “Moonlight” unfolds softly with a steady and stealthy rhythm that is much like life.

Write Ian at [email protected]

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