MOONLIGHT [2016]

Writer/director Barry Jenkins makes his feature length debut with the understated but emotionally heavy coming-of-age drama Moonlight.
It tells the story through three different ages of a young gay black male who grows up facing many obstacles in a rough Miami neighborhood.
Each segment is graced some marvelous performances, all of which shine with loneliness, confusion and a professionalism that gives it all a heartbreaking authenticity.  With plenty of over-the-shoulder photography we're drawn closer into the world in such an intimate manner each moment matters.  Composer Nicholas Britell's music is most unlike anything a film of this style would usually calls for and it helps elevate it to something even more powerful.  Raw, lyrical and solemn, this is cinematic storytelling at some of it's elegantly mature.

4½ crowns on the dashboard out of 5