A Brighter Summer Day

I mean, a film like Edward Yang's *A Brighter Summer Day* is a huge touchstone for me. The idea of something that begins very gently and very naturally and very subtly, and then just very slowly creeps into something truly horrifying and tragic.

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When I started to make ‘Columbus,’ I returned to my roots, and Edward Yang, particularly ‘A Brighter Summer Day,’ was a big influence on just observing characters.

Barry Jenkins has cited Claire Denis's Beau Travail as a foundational influence, the film that showed him how to use the body, light, and music as primary storytelling tools rather than dialogue. Moonlight's fragmented structure, its use of color as emotion, its willingness to let silence carry meaning, these are lessons from Denis and Wong Kar-wai. Beau Travail is streaming on Criterion Channel and is one of the most beautiful films ever made.