“Moonlight,” the sophomore film of director Barry Jenkins, is quiet. Like its main character Chiron, the movie doesn’t say much in terms of dialogue — searing and vibrant visuals do all of the talking instead, powerful gazes and pointed body language communicating what the characters’ words do not. But in its silence “Moonlight” speaks volumes, wielding its tersely poetic features to stir the viewer in a deeply personal manner.
Jenkins’ film finds its footing in the growth and examination of its characters, trading in an action-packed plot for one that drifts and ebbs over the events of a single man’s life. Pulling its story from the play “In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue,” “Moonlight” chronicles the experiences of Chiron (played by Alex Hibbert, Ashton Sanders and Trevante Rhodes as a child, teen and adult respectively) over the span of three chronological chapters. The viewer watches the meek and withdrawn child Chiron grow up through these vignettes, serving as small and intimate windows into his life that are stapled with familiar struggles and figures.
And Chiron does struggle, because he is black, poor and gay — an identity with fierce and difficult intersections that he grapples with throughout his life. These parts of his character are explored from the outset of the film, when the viewer learns that Chiron comes from a broken household; his father is nowhere to be found, and his mother is a hapless abuser (of her son, of drugs). He’s taunted and ostracized by the boys at his school because of the way he carries himself — they patronizingly nickname him “Little” and chase him in droves after school.
Out of these wearying realities, Chiron finds comfort in the presence of Juan (played by Mahershala Ali), a warm and kind-hearted drug dealer, who gives him a home and a meal when he needs it, not asking for much in return but conversation — which Chiron always struggles to provide. Juan is tender with him in a way that Chiron’s never experienced. In one pivotal scene, Jenkins’s camera bobs above and below the water as Juan gently teaches Chiron how to swim, holding him like a father would and whispering words of encouragement: “I got you. I promise. I won't let you go.”
The intimacy, crafted by Jenkins with his intimate, vérité direction, is as touching as it is heart-breaking, especially when Chiron probes Juan about the harsher realities of his life as the two grow closer. It is in these tense moments that Jenkins propels Chiron forward into his identity as a black boy, using his makeshift father figure as a proxy for his self-realization — Juan is not free from the burdens of his race and class status, painting Chiron a hardened and exhausting portrait of what it means to be black and poor.
While Juan shapes Chiron’s perceptions of blackness and masculinity, his friend Kevin demonstrates what love is supposed to look and feel like. A friend of Chiron’s since childhood, Kevin (played by Jaden Piner, Jharrel Jerome and André Holland as a child, teen and adult respectively) is talkative and vibrant and outwardly sexual, a direct foil to the quietness and vulnerabilities that plague Chiron. Kevin urges Chiron to understand that he is worthy, important and deserving of love and intimacy — validation that was never rolled off the tongue of Chiron’s mother or his peers.
Jenkins’s characterization of Chiron and Kevin is essential to the success of his film — the way that they gaze at each other is electric and consistent throughout each chapter, causing the film’s coherence to be created through actions more than appearances. Indeed, “Moonlight” is a character study, allowing the viewer to become well-versed in the movements and body languages of Chiron and Kevin, which are necessary when so little is spoken between the two. The score, composed by Nicholas Britell, encircles each moment of silence, making them ache with emotion and demonstrating the idea that bodies and stolen glances can communicate more than words ever could.
Crucial, too, are the cinematography and direction, which are exhilarating and profoundly moving: “Moonlight” is perhaps one of the most dynamic films of the year purely from a visual standpoint. The tracking shots that follow Chiron from behind as he walks, the tight frame on Chiron’s hand grasping the sand as Kevin gives him his first kiss on a moonlit beach, the screaming face of Chiron’s mother aimed directly at the camera. These choices made by Jenkins pull the viewer into the film in a manner that’s both intimate and immediate.
“Moonlight” reminds us that, regardless of the nuances of our identities which may bind and divide us, we are all humans desperate for acceptance and agency in a world dominated by our ability to make connections with others. Chiron’s torments are not just his, but they’re ours — we are all impossibly burdened by our upbringings and at times uncomfortable in our own skin, but we are not alone. That’s what makes “Moonlight” so devastatingly personal: Kind strangers who take us in like they’re our parents and friends who validate our feelings may move in and out of our lives, but for a brief moment, they were there. And in that truth, “Moonlight” allows us to find solace.
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