Click here to copy URL

If Beale Street Could Talk

2018

Barry Jenkins

KiKi Layne, Stephan James, Regina King, Diego Luna ...

6.3

4,414

Romance. Drama Based on the novel by James Baldwin, “If Beale Street Could Talk” follows Tish, a newly engaged Harlem woman who races against the clock to prove her lover’s innocence while carrying their unborn child. The movie is a celebration of love told through the story of a young couple, their families, and their lives.

	Media	Author	Review
		David Rooney The Hollywood Reporter	"The drama is fully inhabited and alive (...) The exquisite production and costume design, together with the graceful, always meticulously calibrated movement of camera makes for a uniquely seductive visual experience."
		Peter Travers Rolling Stone	"Jenkins wants to create a tone poem out of heartbreak (...) It’s the sort of cinema that feels steeped in the past, completely of the moment and timeless all at once. (…) Rating: ★★★★½ (out of 5)"
		Peter Debruge Variety	"Jenkins brings a colorful, idealistic eye to the novel (...) A work of social realism elevated to poetic heights by the sheer beauty of its voice and the humanism of its spirit"
		Odie Henderson rogerebert.com	"Jenkins' decision to let the original storyteller live and breathe throughout 'If Beale Street Can Talk' is a wise one (…) Rating: ★★★★ (out of 4)"
		Manohla Dargis The New York Times	"A sensitive colorist, Jenkins’s work here is subtler than in 'Moonlight,' (...) A familiar story of raw, brutal American racial injustice, and it is devastating."
		Jason Bailey The Playlist	"In a time when the frustrations of mainstream movies have caused so many a modern filmgoer to long for the cinema of the ‘70s, here is a director whose work has the emotional immediacy of the best of that period."
		Eric Kohn IndieWire	"[It] maintains with his own profound, expressionistic aesthetic, resulting in a fascinating hybrid experience — a seminal voice of the past merging with one of the present in a mesmerizing burst of creative passion."
		Matt Donnelly The Wrap	"Their glances, light touches, their smiles, even their squabbles and mundane chores are breathtaking (...) It’s there in this work, [Jenkins] dream. 'Beale Street' is not inclusive, it is transcendent."
		Inkoo Kang Slate	"In the movies, love is cheap. It's everywhere and nowhere, too often reduced to a formula or a reward. Beale Street knows better."
		David Crow Den of Geek	"Jenkins crafts an ultimately epic portrait of love, loss, racism, and a system shrouded in an ambiguity deeper than black or white (...) Rating: ★★★★★ (out of 5)"
		Benjamin Lee The Guardian	"It’s still far from conventional (...) It’s satisfying to feel so much while watching it. Sensorily and emotionally, it’s an almost overwhelming experience (…) Rating: ★★★★ (out of 5)"
		Tim Grierson Screendaily	"If 'Beale Street' isn’t quite as seamless as 'Moonlight', this adaptation of the James Baldwin novel still proves to be a stirring, absorbing experience that articulates something ineffable about everyday life."

Return to movie

We encourage you to check the reviews' original sources. Intellectual property rights of these reviews belong to their authors and/or the correspondent media from which they have been extracted. If you'd like to help us to add more reviews to your favorite movies, just send us a message.