Barry Jenkins

Mufasa, a cub lost and alone, meets a sympathetic lion named Taka, the heir to a royal bloodline. The chance meeting sets in motion an expansive journey of a group of misfits searching for their destiny.

Another Young Couple — borne out of a camera test for If Beale Street Could Talk, James and I asked my friends Essence and Jihaari, newly transplanted to LA to allow us into their home for an afternoon tea about their lives and loves, apart and together. We were migrating to the Alexa 65 for Beale Street and wanted to see for ourselves how that large-format sensor would affect intimate portraiture within lived spaces… in particular the faces and spaces of Black folk.

In all my years of doing press, I've been repeatedly asked about the white gaze. Rarely have I been set upon about the Black gaze; or the gaze distilled. This is an answer to a question rarely asked.

After her fiance is falsely imprisoned, a pregnant African-American woman sets out to clear his name and prove his innocence.

The tender, heartbreaking story of a young man’s struggle to find himself, told across three defining chapters in his life as he experiences the ecstasy, pain, and beauty of falling in love, while grappling with his own sexuality.

Oakland, California's "boxing gym of champions" is showcased here, its historic walls lined with posters for matches boasting past regulars from George Foreman and Joe Frazier to Gina Guidi. Though the crowded environ may be one of sweaty, noisy machismo, director Barry Jenkins' surprisingly lyrical miniature uses a delicate piano score and slow motion images to enter a contender's solitary headspace.

The story of a young girl and her fleeting relationship with a scoundrel.

Upon returning to their countryside cabin one day, Kaya, his wife Helen, and their daughter Naomi are confronted by two suited men: representatives of the San Francisco Remigration Program. The men explain that San Francisco is now occupied entirely by the wealthy class. But stoplights still burn out and trains occasionally jump their rails. Blue-collar labor isn't obsolete, but it's scarce. The city has created a program to "remigrate" long-gone working class families from their inland homes back to the city that once pushed them out. Kaya, Helen, and Naomi return to San Francisco and join a handful of other potential remigrants for a tour of what can be expected in their new lives. But can they learn to trust their old home once again?

Love knows no borders in this stylish snapshot of interracial coupledom. Two Brooklyn photographers (she, African-American; he, Chinese-American) meet and their romance blossoms and endures back home, amidst a poetical widescreen mix of images both seductive and sedate.

A couple discuss their relationship.

Its single hand-held shot lends both immediacy of viewpoint and a floating unreality to a young woman's visit to a Seattle convenience store, seemingly fraught with menacing purpose.

Waking from a one-night stand that neither remembers, Micah and Joanne find themselves wandering the streets of San Francisco, sharing coffee and conversation and searching for a deeper connection.

A little brown boy gets caught up in a violent shooting and must come to terms with the incident and the part he has played.

Aadid tells us his life in seven minutes. He's an Arabic-speaking young man working the night shift at a laundromat and dry cleaners somewhere in the United States. In the aftermath of 9/11, they wash U.S. flags for free. He says they get six or seven per day. He tells us about Napoleon's two wives: Marie Louise for an heir, Josephine for love. Aadid likes Adela, his co-worker. She's his Josephine. We watch Aadid and Adela hand wash the flags and put them in dryers. They fold them. They dance. They stand side by side outside the door of the laundromat looking at the dawn. Will this companionship become something more?