So the Oscars is all about Brian Cullinan and PwC, as well as Warren Beatty a little bit. La La Land and Moonlight both ended up with the attention they didn’t deserve. So how about the movie itself? Is it really that good or just a bit boring really?
Moonlight is absolutely beautiful and well made movie. Mahershala Ali was probably the best part of the story and I wished he’d have had more screen time. Oscar definitely well deserved. One of the favourite performances I’ve seen in a while.
I think the movie ends up feeling a bit superficial, maybe due to trying to avoid some usual clichés, or simply because of trying to fit in too much. The actors do hold the movie together, but I’m still about to say Moonlight seems unnecessarily long. In other words, it’s a bit boring, really. We get to see some powerful acting and reactions, but a lot of time there’s just the powerful atmosphere and nothing else. It is beautiful, but it is definitely lacking any attempt to show how bad the problems the character(s) are facing in life. It’s obviously not sugar coated, but it’s not far off. Not saying we need to see all the misery in the world all over again – I know it’s all been shown before, over and over. But there’s definitely something missing here. Maybe something you might find in a Mike Leigh film.
Barry Jenkins directs the actors well though, and all of them do a good job, though the first part / act, however you want to call it, while seeming slightly unrealistic, felt more powerful than the following parts.
Again, not really knowing anything about the movie in advance, apart from knowing it’s nominated for Oscars in a few categories, was probably a good thing. We definitely need more movies like this and more of the same in the Oscars and Baftas and all the rest. But just because it’s the only one, doesn’t mean it’s all that good. Maybe it’s alright, but in order to win you have to be amazing and that’s just not true. And before anyone else starts complaining, of course this is not the only movie out there revolving around these issues, but which other movies do you hear people talking about and getting nominated. More good movies dealing with important issues need more exposure, better marketing, more publicity, and at the moment that still seems to be difficult.
