‘Moonlight’ screens at The Ellen Theatre

BOZEMAN FILM SOCIETY

Bozeman Film Society will present ‘Moonlight’ at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Dec. 13, in The Ellen Theatre.

A disarmingly tender and heartbreaking story of a young man’s struggle to find himself, the film was adapted and directed by Barry Jenkins from “In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue,” a never-produced story by black, gay playwright Tarell Alvin McCraney.

‘Moonlight’ follows a boy named Chiron (played at different ages by Alex Hibbert, Ashton Sanders and Trevante Rhodes) whose sensitivity, sexuality and dark skin have left him especially vulnerable in the sunlit streets of 1980s Miami.

The film is an amalgam of Jenkins’ and McCraney’s biographies—both men grew up in Miami’s Liberty Square neighborhood at the same time, and both had mothers who grappled with drug addiction (Jenkins’ mother survived, McCraney’s did not). McCraney is gay, while Jenkins is straight.

Shot on the same city blocks where Jenkins lived as a child, audiences and critics alike have responded to the film’s vulnerability and authenticity, which shows a world rarely seen on the big screen.

Los Angeles Times film critic Kenneth Turan said, “‘Moonlight’ is magic—so intimate you feel like you’re trespassing on its characters’ souls, so transcendent it’s made visual and emotional poetry out of intensely painful experiences. It’s a film that manages to be both achingly familiar and unlike anything we’ve seen before.”

Rated R, the film earned a 98-percent Rotten Tomatoes score and it runs 111 minutes.

The Ellen Theatre lobby opens at 6 p.m. for concession and bar; seating begins at 6:30 p.m.; and shows begin at 7 p.m. Visit bozemanfilmsociety.org for more information.