It was the Oscar win heard around the world: the Hollywood hullabaloo surrounding “Moonlight’s” historic Academy Award win for Best Picture in 2017. You know, the one where the statuette was accidentally and awkwardly given to “La La Land” first before that jaw-dropping envelope switch-up. The resulting furor was so loud that it nearly drowned out exactly how excellent the film was and remains a decade after its debut.
The low-budget drama was a monumental achievement for director Barry Jenkins and film studio A24, a queer indie featuring an all-Black cast of largely unknowns that unexpectedly rose to the highest echelons of the entertainment industry. But more so than its commercial and cultural impact, it's the movie’s visual poetry and emotional resonance that’s just as stirring now as it was ten years ago.
To celebrate a decade of “Moonlight,” here’s why you should revisit the award winner on Hulu.
What is 'Moonlight' about?
Told across three distinct chapters of life — childhood, adolescence and adulthood — “Moonlight” follows Chiron (played by Alex Hibbert, Ashton Sanders and Trevante Rhodes in each respective stage), a young Black man growing up in a rough neighborhood of Miami and later Atlanta.
As Chiron navigates poverty, physical and emotional abuse, and the socioeconomic hardships of his upbringing, he also has to grapple with complex questions of identity, masculinity and sexuality, especially his growing attraction to his childhood friend Kevin (portrayed by Jaden Piner in Act One, Jharrel Jerome in Act Two and André Holland in that searingly sensual finale).
Why I recommend you stream 'Moonlight'
Saying “Moonlight” is critically acclaimed is a dumb understatement. Along with that shiny, shock-to-the-world Oscar, Jenkins’ masterpiece has a near-perfect 98% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, where critics praised the film for using “one man's story to offer a remarkable and brilliantly crafted look at lives too rarely seen in cinema."
But the three-act tale is also deeply human and achingly personal, wrenching universal truths out of the specificity of Chiron’s circumstances. The drama’s ensemble (largely made up of new faces but with a few notable names mixed in, including Naomie Harris, Janelle Monáe and an astonishing Mahershala Ali) gorgeously settles into the raw intimacy of Chiron’s world, so much so that you feel like you’re wafting in the waves right alongside Juan and Little.
A movie with such unabashed tenderness and quiet beauty still feels like a rare thing even a decade on, it’s proof that the glow of "Moonlight" only gets brighter with time.
Watch "Moonlight" on Hulu now
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