IT’S A PRESTIGE LITERARY ADAPTATION

The film is Jenkins’ adaptation of James Baldwin’s 1974 novel (he secured the rights before he started Moonlight). Jenkins stays close to the source material, as Tish, in voiceover, quotes lines from the book verbatim. Baldwin’s words, combined with the sun-soaked setting of Seventies Harlem and Jenkins’ trademark character close ups, give the film a strikingly poetic air.

IT’S HEARTBREAKING

One of the most agonising aspects of If Beale Street Could Talk is the knowledge that Tish and Fonny’s romance will be frustrated by forces outside of their control. Heartbreakingly, it still resonates as a forceful portrait of the injustices that continue to thwart people of colour in America.

If Beale Street Could Talk is the romantic film everyone needs to see in 2019