Member-only story
Did White Shame Hurt This Black Film’s Oscar Shot?
How Barry Jenkins went from Moonlight to Best Picture snub.
In a banner year for black cinema and race-themed films, Black Panther, BlacKkKlansman, and the controversial Green Book all managed to do what If Beale Street Could Talk couldn’t: score an Oscar nomination for Best Picture.
How did Beale Street get left out in the cold? The answer might lie partly in a 10-minute scene about 46 minutes into the film that basically characterizes hell as white people.
A few months ago, before the year-end onslaught of Academy Award hopefuls hit cinemas, Beale Street had “Oscar-caliber” written all over it. But then the nominations were announced on January 21, and the critically lauded film missed the Best Picture shortlist. If Beale Street could talk, it probably would have said, “I shoulda woulda coulda been a contender.”
That’s not really hubris: The acclaimed film has a 95 percent approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes (higher than five of the Best Picture nominees), and it was directed by Barry Jenkins, the man who gave us Moonlight, the 2016 Best Picture Oscar winner. That movie also earned him a Best Director nod and a Best Original Screenplay win.
