English film club Locarno

"If beale street could talk" (2018)

117 minutes
Directed by Barry Jenkins
Starring Kiki Layne, Stephan James, Regina King

If Beale Street Could Talk is narrated by Tish (whose real name is Clementine Rivers), a 19-year-old African-American woman who lives in a Harlem project and works at the perfume counter of a department store. Her mother is from Birmingham, Alabama, and her father works on the docks. She is pregnant with the child of her boyfriend, Fonny (whose real name is Alonzo Hunt), a 22-year-old African-American sculptor who is in jail. He has been falsely accused of raping a Puerto Rican woman. Tish's family is very supportive of her and her pregnancy, but Fonny's mother is not supportive and is convinced her son is worthless. Tish's sister, Ernestine or Sis, hires a white lawyer named Mr. Hayward to defend Fonny. The lawyer tells Tish and her mother, Sharon, that Mrs. Victoria Rogers (her maiden name was Sanchez), the woman who has accused Fonny, has returned to Puerto Rico. A white police officer named Bell presented Fonny to Mrs. Rogers, and she simply accepted Bell's word that Fonny was the rapist and picked him out of a lineup. Tish goes to see Fonny in prison, who looks worse than ever. She has bad news: Victoria Rogers has disappeared again, and now the trial might be postponed. Fonny is distraught. Tish has the baby, and Fonny, faced with the prospect of losing the trial, takes a plea for a lesser sentence. Several years later, Tish brings their child, a young boy named after his father, to visiting hours at the prison. The three have a makeshift family dinner with food bought from the vending machines and enjoy having some moments actually together.