If Beale Street Could Talk (2018, R)

I’ve been wanting to see this movie since I first heard about it, and it finally came to my local theater.  In a word?  Beautiful.  This is a gorgeous film that deals with harsh subject matter but still incorporates such moments of light and life.

Based on a James Baldwin novel, If Beale Street Could Talk follows Fonny and Tish’s attempt at a love story in the face of systemic racism.  The gentle tale of the young couple falling in love is marked, not only by their struggles to find anyone willing to rent a decent apartment to Black people, but also by Tish’s efforts to help Fonny when he’s arrested for a crime he didn’t commit.  Pregnant with Fonny’s child and unmarried only because the corrupt judicial system has forced them apart, Tish fights to exonerate her man.

A running theme for me in movies I’ve seen so far this winter has been “I don’t know how accurate this is,” and while this isn’t a true story, it still applies to this movie.  I’ve never read If Beale Street Could Talk, though I now want to, and so I’m not sure how well it adapts its source material.  But however it translates from the book, it plays out excellently onscreen.  The film is Barry Jenkins’s follow-up to Moonlight, and I find it stellar in pretty much every way.

First of all, the look of this film is just incredible.  The careful choices that go into the costuming, the use of light, the way every shot looks like it could be a still photo – it’s a feast for the eyes, and the beauty carries over into the music as well.  I could just look at this movie all day long.

Oh yeah, and there’s the story too!  The romance is as tender as it is sumptuous, by turns shy, passionate, and achingly pure.  I love the beautiful simplicity of all the romantic scenes, which scorch the screen in the most soulful way.  The social messages that carry into the darker sides of the story hit home really effectively – an extended scene of one of Fonny’s friends describing his experiences in prison is a standout in a film full of fine moments.  And for that matter, the film’s messages leave room for complication and nuance, such as in the way Tish’s family fights for Fonny without demonizing the woman who named him her rapist. 

What I really like is how the movie balances its light and dark aspects.  The non-linear narrative, for my money, is essential.  Told chronologically, this story of two hopeful young people would descend into bleakness and fury as we watch how inexorably their lives are marred by racial injustice.  As it is, there are still major points of despair, of anger, but they’re interspersed with lovelier, happier memories, which makes it easier to see how the characters still find things to hope in as their situations get worse.

The cast is wonderful across the board.  At the center of the story are Stephan James (who played Jesse Owens in Race a few years ago) and Kiki Layne as Fonny and Tish, and Tish’s family includes Regina King as Tish’s mother (garnering one of the film’s few Oscar nominations) and Teyonah Parris (who I really liked in Chi-Raq) as Tish’s sister.  Atlanta’s Brian Tyree Henry knocks it out of the park in a minor role, and the film also features brief appearances from Diego Luna and Pedro Pascal.

Other than Regina King’s Best Supporting Actress nomination, the film also received nods for its score and its screenplay.  While I wholeheartedly agree with these, I wish it had gotten more recognition – a Best Picture nomination, absolutely, along with its direction, cinematography, and maybe more acting.  I get that there’s so much talent every year, and maybe by the time I post about the nominations I’d have chosen for my favorite categories, some of these will get crowded out, but it feels like the Academy is framing this movie as a footnote in the story of this year’s films, and that doesn’t feel right to me.

Warnings

Violence, sexual content, language (including the N-word,) drinking/smoking, and strong thematic elements.