Textual Analysis Inquiry

Selected Film: Moonlight 

Research question: how does Moonlight display an intersectional escape from the traditional media representation of black and queer individuals?

Cultural Context: Socio-Institutional 

Film Elements: Codes/Conventions (Technical and characters), Cinematography (Lighting and Angles), Editing (Pacing), Narrative Structure (Three act), and Motifs/Symbols. 

Extract: the beach kissing scene 

Annotated Bibliography: 

Barco, Mandalit del. “In 'Moonlight,' Growing Up Black, Gay And Poor In 1980s Miami.” NPR, NPR, 18 Oct. 2016, www.npr.org/2016/10/18/498358778/moonlight-coming-of-age-in-miami-during-the-war-on-drugs-era#:~:text=The%20new%20movie%20Moonlight%20is,mother%20is%20a%20crack%20addict. 

    This article has a fantastic quote that helps my overall argument from Barry Jenkins: "I thought back on growing up in the village, there were these men who would every now and then just go out of their way to be like, naw, naw, naw, don't do that. ... And I hadn't really seen it sort of done in a movie or a TV show, carrying the warmth that I think it carries for the characters in this film" Also, I think I may use some of the critical pieces from this article in my wider essay, but I want to avoid doing that.

DuVernay, Ava, director. 13th. Netflix , 2016. 

    This movie briefly describes the history of black men being characterizing in movies as criminals, particularly focusing on The Birth of a Nation which I would like to discus in the introduction of my essay. 

Gates, Racquel. “THE LAST SHALL BE FIRST: AESTHETICS AND POLITICS IN BLACK FILM AND MEDIA.” Film Quarterly, vol. 71, no. 2, 2017, pp. 38–45. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/26413861. Accessed 10 Feb. 2021.

    This provides an analysis of the way white cinema has developed most of their technical elements around white people. The article directly talks about moonlight's lighting in relation to this problem.

“Media Portrayals and Black Male Outcomes.” The Opportunity Agenda, www.opportunityagenda.org/explore/resources-publications/media-representations-impact-black-men/media-portrayals. 

    This article provides a broad overview of the media portals of black men. I will be primarily using it for its discussion of the Thug trope. 

Pramaggiore, Maria, and Tom Wallis. Film: a Critical Introduction. King, 2011. 

    I will be using this for the codes/conventions section of the essay using chapters 4, 5, and 10.  I will also be using this if I need a citation on any the formalist elements I am discussing, however I do not see that happening. 

Shaw, Susan M., and Janet Lee. Gendered Voices, Feminist Visions: Classic and Contemporary Readings / Compiled and Edited by Susan M. Shaw, Oregon State University, Janet Lee, Oregon State University. Oxford University Press, 2020. 

        

    This book will be used in the theory section of the essay in which I set up what intersectionality is. Furthermore, I will be pulling some of my research on the traditional media representation of gay people from this text, especially in discussing the problem of fetishization. Developing a strong theory section of the essay will be essential as I will be relating the formal aspects of the film to that theory constantly and that theory works as the cultural context to a degree.