gray ash on the fingertips and red desert sand underneath the feet. the house that never feels like home and theo feeling hopeless and alone and confused. that ash was never washed away, deeply inhaled into the mind of a little boy and left running through the veins, mixing with blood and drugs.

visually stunning and narratively confusing, the goldfinch is a beautiful mess of a movie. and i’m saying it in the most loving way possible. abrupt dialogue, non-linear story and characters, who never truly know themselves is what i think works best for these broken, messed up people. mixed with drugs and alcohol, they always say the wrong things, always behave out of place and act illogically. it feels like a drug infused fantasy, mixed with alcohol and ghosts of the past.

i might be biased but this book and this film came into my life at the right time, when i was confused and lonely and broken, and maybe that’s why it works for me. remembering episodes of life that feel more like a dream or another bad trip because you’re not sure what was real anymore. “before and after”. this is how the film puts it. and i feel it so deeply. seeing theo being at his worst, struggling to feel like a person and thinking that everything is somehow his fault awakened this deep buried feeling inside of me. of course, my life is not at this extreme but it’s just as confusing and i am just as lost. sometimes i think that not every piece of art has to be perfect but as long as it makes you feel something, it’s a piece of art for you.

ps. even this review is all over the fucking place, i really can’t explain why i loved it so much, i just did.