If Beale Street Could Talk 🌆
Happy Tuesday! Hope you had a great start to your week. If not, sit back, relax, and watch a movie!
Today, we’re continuing this week’s theme of movies set in New York City 🗽🏙 with one of my favorites from last year — and maybe of the decade. You might want to break a box of tissues out for this one.
What’s it about: Based on the James Baldwin novel of the same name, If Beale Street Could Talk follows Tish (Kiki Layne) — a young black woman living in 1970s Harlem — as she tries to clear her boyfriend Fonny’s (Stephan James) name of a crime he didn’t commit. Told in a non-linear form, the movie tracks their relationship from its hopeful start through all their highs and lows.
“Every black person born in America was born on Beale Street, born in the black neighborhood of some American city, whether in Jackson, Mississippi or in Harlem, New York. Beale Street is our legacy.” — James BaldwinWhy it’s great: The two GIFs above come from a scene midway through the movie after Tish and Fonny are finally able to secure an apartment for themselves. Just look at them. You can feel the hope, excitement, and freedom they both feel.
Director Barry Jenkins — who won an Oscar for Moonlight — is so talented at communicating emotion through film. And while there is the underlying thread of Fonny’s case to pull the movie together, at it’s core, If Beale Street Could Talk is a romance about first love — and it so beautifully captures the feelings that go along with it.
The movie is pieced together like a memory, shot like a dream, and Nicholas Britell’s score has a melancholic, jazz-infused sound with notes of hope and yearning. All those elements come together to create a masterwork of mood. It’s truly a masterpiece — Jenkins’ second one in a row.
The key players:
🎬🖋 Barry Jenkins
🎵 Nicholas Britell
🎭 KiKi Layne, Stephan James, Regina King, Colman Domingo, Teyonah Parris, Brian Tyree Henry, Dave Franco, Diego Luna, Pedro Pascal
The details: ⏳ 117 minutes // 🇺🇸 U.S. // 📝 My full review // 📺 Trailer
Fun fact: If Beale Street Could Talk was nominated for three Oscars with Regina King winning Best Supporting Actress for her performance. If it were up to me, I would have given it ten nominations — can you guess which categories?
Don’t have Hulu? If Beale Street Could Talk is available to buy or rent on Prime Video, iTunes, and Google Play.
In movie news:
The first trailer for Jojo Rabbit, the newest film from director Taika Waititi (Thor: Ragnarok, The Hunt for the Wilderpeople), is here.
My take: It’s interesting to see how Fox Searchlight is handling marketing this movie since it’s one of their first under the Disney umbrella. The fact that it’s messaged as an anti-hate satire is telling. They’re probably looking to avoid it being co-opted by the right like another upcoming release *cough*Joker*cough*. Allegedly, a Disney executive was even worried that “the material would alienate Disney fans.”
Thank you for reading! If you ever want to get in touch, just reply to any email or DM me on Twitter — I’m always up for a conversation.
See you tomorrow,
Karl (@karl_delo)