In the 16 years since his first film, 2008's Medicine for Melancholy, Barry Jenkins has directed three more features: 2016's Best Picture-winning Moonlight, 2018's Oscar-winning If Beale Street Could Talk, and the forthcoming Mufasa: The Lion King. (In between the latter two films, he also directed a 10-episode limited series adaptation of Colson Whitehead's The Underground Railroad.)
Different as the projects may appear on paper, the filmmaker reveals that they all started with the same unique sensation. "I'll read something and I'll start to see it in my head, and when I do, an emotion comes across," he explains. "What happens isn't quite synesthesia, but when I read a script or a book or a play and I start visualizing what a film version of it might look like, an emotion becomes attached to it. When that happens — and it doesn't happen often — I chase after it."
Jenkins' creative pursuits have, in other words, been purely instinctual. "The thrill of that approach is that Moonlight, If Beale Street Could Talk, and The Underground Railroad are all very different works," he adds.
A graduate of Florida State University's College of Motion Picture Art, Jenkins has found ways to experiment with form on a grand scale throughout his career. From his indie roots to a franchise blockbuster like Mufasa, the filmmaker has done it all, while managing to bring his singular voice to each project. (He won the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay with Moonlight.) Despite that, he says that neither his perspective on filmmaking nor his directorial process has changed considerably since he made that first movie.
"I think that's one thing that continues to serve me very well — understanding that, just because the means of making a thing may change, the approach to making it or the reason for making it doesn't need to change," Jenkins reflects. "I haven't made a lot. Moonlight, Beale Street, The Underground Railroad, and Mufasa — those are just four projects. So, maybe as I get deeper and deeper into my career, I'll look back and have a different answer to that question, but my approach hasn't changed yet."
Below, Jenkins shares with A.frame five pieces of visual media, including two music videos, that have had a profound impact on him.
Directed by: Tom Tykwer | Written by: Krzysztof Kieślowski and Krzysztof Piesiewicz
I remember when Heaven came out, I was living in Tallahassee at the time and going to film school. I went out one night to the very small, out-of-the-way foreign independent movie theater called the Miracle 5, and I watched that film. I was the only person in the audience. It's one of those movies where it doesn't feel like there are any cuts or edits. It just flows, and Tom Tykwer uses this piece of music by Arvo Pärt, which everybody was using in their trailers at the time, in a way that is just so effective.
When the movie ended, the lights came up, the usher came in, and I was still the only person in the theater. I was a film student and I was so broke, so I said to the usher, "Hey, do you mind if I watch it again?" He was like, "Yeah, nobody else is coming. Feel free." So, the lights went down and I watched the movie again. I've never done that. I sat in the theater and watched Heaven twice on a Thursday afternoon. That film holds a very special place in my heart. It's one I own on physical media, because seeing it was such a profound film-going experience for me.
Directed by: The Blaze
The next piece I want to talk about is a short film/music video for a song called "Territory," by this band called The Blaze. It's very easy to find on YouTube, and it's really interesting. The band made the music video themselves, and it's all about this boxer and he's been living in France, but he goes home to Algeria. It's implied that he's maybe failed in some way in France, so he comes home and the video is about the way his homeland embraces him. Some of the images in the video are just incredible. If anyone hasn't seen it, they should go watch it, because they'll end up watching it five times in a row. I guarantee it.
Directed and Written by: Gus Van Sant
Elephant is a film that came out just after I graduated from film school, so it's another movie that came out during a very formative time in my life. I've always been involved in some way with the Telluride Film Festival, and Telluride showed Elephant after it played at Cannes. I watched it at the festival in this theater called The Galaxy, which is a former elementary school basketball gym that was converted into a movie theater. The festival showed Elephant in 4:3, which is the format it's intended to be screened in, and the projection made it look like it was part of this cinema box floating in a void. I felt utterly transported.
When I went to college a few years earlier, that's when the Columbine school shooting happened. Cut to 2003, and I'm watching Elephant in Colorado. I left the theater feeling like I'd been floating inside this dark room, and there were people bawling in the courtyard. I've never read an interview with Gus Van Sant about the film — partly because it's been so long since I watched it and partly because the internet wasn't back then what it is now — but I would be curious to learn what energy he was seeking when he made it, because he definitely achieved something that is very, very profound. It's always stuck with me.
Directed by: Kahlil Joseph
An artist named Kahlil Joseph made this music video for Flying Lotus called "Until the Quiet Comes," and it's absolutely ravishing and gorgeous. It's set in this housing project called Nickerson Gardens in this neighborhood in Los Angeles called Watts, and the video is a dance piece. But it's also this very distilled portrait of what it was like to be a person living in that place at the time it was made and wanting to express yourself by whatever means possible. It's a very, very potent piece of work.
Directed and Written by: Gaspar Noé
The last entry on this list is also the most recent film on it, and it's Vortex. I love that film. When I first saw it, the form of it was so unique that I felt like I was watching a movie for the very first time. I know that's a crazy thing to say, but the way your eyes track every movement throughout the movie because of its split frame dynamic is truly amazing. I think Gaspar Noé used form to arrive at something that was absolutely singular and unique and, for that reason, Vortex has really stayed with me.
I remember I went on a Twitter rampage about that film when it came out. I sent so many tweets about how awesome the movie was, and those tweets actually reached Gaspar, which I didn't expect. But the film had such a profound effect on me that I wanted someone to know it was out there and to know my thoughts on it. Sometimes, you just need to talk about a film after you see it, especially in a time where it seems like the movies we're making are conforming to a very slim, narrow idea of what a film can be. Watching something like Vortex during a period like the one we're in was just an incredible experience.
Reporting by Alex Welch
