Sunday, August 18…2 screenings @ 3pm and 6pm

Three time periods – young adolescence, mid-teen and young adult – in the life of black-American Chiron is presented. When a child, Chiron lives with his single, crack addict mother Paula in a crime ridden neighborhood in Miami. Chiron is a shy, withdrawn child largely due to his small size and being neglected by his mother, who is more concerned about getting her fixes and satisfying her carnal needs than taking care of him. Because of these issues, Chiron is bullied, the slurs hurled at him which he doesn’t understand beyond knowing that they are meant to be hurtful. Besides his same aged Cuban-American friend Kevin, Chiron is given what little guidance he has in life from a neighborhood drug dealer named Juan, who can see that he is neglected, and Juan’s caring girlfriend Teresa, whose home acts as a sanctuary away from the bullies and away from Paula’s abuse. With this childhood as a foundation, Chiron may have a predetermined path in life, one that will only be magnified in terms of its problems when he reaches his difficult teen years when peer pressure affects what he and many of his peers do, unless he follows Juan’s advice of truly making his own decisions for himself.

Selected by Board Member Board Member – Marisa Quaresimo

Raised in Texas, Kayden Rodriguez (they/them or he/him) found his LGBTQ+ home & family in Tampa, Florida by attending The University of Tampa in 2012. Kayden has been a board member since 02/2020 and is co-founder of the Tampa Bay Transgender Film Festival. With original intentions to become an animator for Pixar, he majored in Digital Art. UTampa’s safe environment took them for a turn, however, as they found passion in merging his media background with LGBTQ+ advocacy during his leadership time with UTampa Pride. Kayden now has a Masters in Social Work, and is Registered Clinical Social Work Intern. He has worked with multiple local LGBTQ+ organizations both as an employee or volunteer, working to educate the LGBTQ+ community & allies alike on the best ways to support each other through community building & mental health advocacy.

Kayden chose Moonlight with intention to highlight and center achievements by the black queer community. Moonlight was released as the first LGBTQ-themed mass-marketed feature film with an all-black cast and was, at the time of its release, the second-lowest-grossing film domestically (behind The Hurt Locker) to win the Oscar for Best Picture in 2017.