If you haven’t seen the trailer for Moonlight or happened to let this movie slip passed you then you missed possibly one of the greatest movies of the year. To be honest, my first view of the movie was from a shortened trailer with an amazing all star cast. I was at work watching my news on YouTube when I saw the interesting Moonlight Trailer go by and I couldn’t skip by it like normal. I looked it up to see when it was playing and couldn’t find anything so I kept searching for it with no luck. Once I got home, I told my girlfriend that I was going to see this amazing movie with a great cast. I pulled up the trailer and threw on TV but this time I was watching the full official trailer not the shortened version I saw previously.

Moonlight is an amazing tale of a young black man growing up in an impoverished crime-filled environment with very few and unlikely role models to help guide him through a difficult world. This premise is not uncommon from any other movie about poor black kids growing up in the ghetto. The only difference, however, is that the main character struggles with his sexual identity. BOOM!!

This isn’t the first movie to discuss sexual identity; this isn’t the first movie to discuss poverty; this isn’t the first movie to discuss anything that we haven’t seen in film before. This is however the first movie to masterfully combine all of these elements in a palatable, understandable, and relatable fashion.

We follow a kid named Little as he navigates through a home managed by a drug addicted mom and a caring drug dealer. At home and in his neighborhood he’s seen and bullied for being “different” but he finds sanctuary in the home of the local drug dealer who accepts him as he is with no questions asked. This inner turmoil continues as hormones increase in his teen years and the battle within continues. Finally we meet Little again as an adult in a male dominated world unfriendly to misplaced femininity and sexual exploration.

Moonlight is possibly the greatest movie I’ve seen in this genre of sexual exploration/identity encompassed in poverty, drugs, and the black community.  I was hesitant to tell people of the excitedness in which I wanted to see this movie given the nature of this movie but what I witnessed was not a “gay” movie if you will but a movie about a man struggling to find his truth and be who he is; a very relatable concept for a black man in America. Although I squirmed at some of the sexual innuendo and some scenes, I appreciated and applauded the amazingly beautiful effort in which the struggle of some of those in my community must endure on  the daily basis.

This movie was PHENOMENAL and if you get the chance to see it please do. Fellas, make this a date night movie and go see it with your girl if the message makes you feel uneasy but if you feel uneasy because of societal perceptions, then you will totally understand the movie.

D’Marco

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