It’s been incredible to watch Moonlight, director Barry Jenkins’ depiction of Black gay love and coming of age, make its way from art house darling to mainstream drama, racking up countless accolades and a recent Golden Globe win for Best Drama along the way.
And as far as conventional cinematic success goes, the last stop on the train is Oscarville. All year films are hyped as “Oscar contenders,” and more often than not it’s just a lot of hot air. Moonlight is the exception.
Related: 5 Reasons Moonlight Might Just Be The Best Movie Of The Year
The film earned an impressive eight nominations, including one for Best Picture and two for Jenkins, for Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay.
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Mahershala Ali was recognized in the Best Supporting Actor category for his portrayal of Juan, a drug dealer who becomes a father figure to the youngest version of lead character, Chiron, and Naomi Harris received a nomination in the Best Supporting Actress category for playing Chiron’s deeply haunting mother.
Related: Beyond Moonlight: 5 Black LGBTQ films that blazed the trail
Nicholas Brittell is up for Best Score, and the film also received noms in the Best Editing and Best Cinematography categories.
Huge congratulations to team Moonlight.
Or in the words of Barry Jenkins:
Just turned my phone on here in Amsterdam. It's ummmmmm… yeah. Oh my. So much love, overwhelmed. Literally and figuratively
— Barry Jenkins (@BandryBarry) January 24, 2017
Now do yourself a favor and see this wonderful film.
JerseyMike
Hopefully moonlight get at least one… love it..
Realitycheck
We both do 🙂
GayEGO
Let’s hope for an Oscar win!
Brian
The Academy will probably favor the “no gays allowed” La La Land.
OzJosh
It’s either a measure of the Academy’s super-sensitivity over diversity, or of what a poor year it’s been for movies that Moonlight could get so many nominations. Rather like LaLa Land, it’s an earnest, well-intentioned, perhaps even deeply-felt film. But it’s also rather slight, workmanlike in most technical respects, and never more than moderately-engaging.
Kangol
I think the cinematography and acting are better than workmanlike, but the story centers around victimhood, which feels a bit retrograde in 2017. But compared to some of the other films nominated, it’s a stronger contender for one of the awards. I hope they don’t reward Naomie Harris’s awful crack-addict mother performance, though. And as much as I love watching Mahershala Ali on any screen, I was bummed that they didn’t nominate the actor I found most riveting, Trevante Rhodes as Black. He wins my Oscar!
Neonegro
I agree, it must have been a poor year in film.
Moonlight is more an after school TV special and is far from being a piece of great cinema.
Realitycheck
At the contrary Moonlight is a masterpiece of reality and considering you are a fake black and not gay I would not expect you to understand the extremely harsh reality of growing up gay and black.
But Moonlight goes well beyond the black experience, it touches the reality of discrimination, school bullying and the often harsh home environment, something most LGBT experience growing up.
Neonegro
A masterpiece to you, an after school special to me.
Learn how to make your point without attacking or questioning a poster’s race.
Be a grown up and stop the childish emotional rant.
cancorv
You know “Reality Check” well enough to make those comments?
cancorv
Sorry, I meant does Reality check know Neonegro well enough to comment like that?
Realitycheck
I think that perhaps the most beautiful thing about Moonlight is its open-endedness,
it is left to each viewer to paint a future for the main character, might that be a finale
or a new start, but either way this movie will touch you emotionally on several levels
and Not in a bad way…
Jack Meoff
The movie is unique in that it is not a coming out story but rather a story of struggle and survival. In the end nothing is resolved and the hero is no better off. He doesn’t get beat up any more but it seems he beats himself up emotionally instead. I am glad I saw the film but I felt it didn’t really live up to the hype. I guess that is the problem when a film gets so much hype, your expectations are higher and you hold it to a higher standard. A couple of excellent performances and a very interesting story which steers well clear of cliched gay story lines.
cancorv
I agree with Jack – it didn’t live up to its hype. The cinematography and the music were wonderful. Lots of fine performances, for sure. But not an innovative story, or a satisfying ending, at least as I saw it.