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Just because something works in one medium does not necessarily imply that it will work in another medium. When it comes to Hollywood, there’s a certain amount of egotism that leads people to believe that anything can be turned into a feature film, whether it’s a TV show, a play, or even a Pulitzer Prize-winning book. However, you simply cannot replicate the sense of urgency that comes from being in a theater with actors, the depth that comes from reading hundreds of pages of a book, or the episodic structure of television. “The Goldfinch,” adapted from Donna Tartt’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel with disastrous results, strips the novel of all nuance, leaving only the plot, which wasn’t exactly the source material’s strength. And there may be no better example of that blind assumption than John Crowley’s “The Goldfinch.” The book is about grief and the sudden trauma that can derail a person’s life, but Crowley’s film appears to have no understanding of either of those concepts and instead uses them as exploitative decoration on a beautiful but shockingly hollow experience.
It is based on a painting that was on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art the day that Theo Decker’s life was forever changed. The title of the book and the film both refer to this painting. Theo (Oakes Fegley) was with his mother when a terrorist attack took place, killing her and several others and leaving a swath of rubble in its wake. In the morning, Theo awoke and went to get the painting, which had survived for centuries and been passed down through generations, but which now appears to be at risk of being lost in the grief spiral that Theo is about to enter over the next two decades of his life.
He is given a ring by an elderly man who is dying and instructed to return it to his partner Hobie before he can take the painting (Jeffrey Wright). With his mother dead and his father missing, young Theo finds himself caught between two worlds: the world of an upper-class family who takes him in and is led by a matriarch played by Nicole Kidman, and the world of Hobie, who runs an antiques shop. Of course, both are extremely formative, and one of the most compelling themes of this narrative is what Paul Auster refers to as “the music of chance”—the idea that random events, even tragedies, can shape us into people we would not otherwise be if they did not occur.
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Even though Tartt’s novel contains a great deal of deep, philosophical material, the film’s screenplay by Peter Straughan, which is incredibly frustrating, strips away almost all of the character detail from a book that is dense with it. Tartt has the freedom to immerse readers in the development of Theodore Decker over the course of nearly 800 pages, which is told in first-person. This is something that filmmakers have simply never figured out how to accomplish on film. He’s a black hole at the heart of this film, someone who simply reacts to what is going on around him, and while Shailene Woodley is excellent as the child version, Ansel Elgort completely loses his way as the older version of the character. However, hm can’t really be held responsible for the poor dialogue and incredibly awkward handling of some of the action in the final act of the film. Overall, most of the performances are mediocre—Kidman is completely wasted—with the possible exception of Wright, who is one of the few members of the cast who appears to be more concerned with character development than plot development.
The Goldfinch Quiz
“The Goldfinch” has a lot of money and talent behind it, which gives it the appearance of being “important.” After all, Roger Deakins shot it, and he isn’t about to turn it into a snoozer of a film. The costumes, the lavish interiors, and even the score by Trevor Gureckis are all designed to give the impression of a high-class, serious drama, which is sometimes referred to as “prestige” or, less kindly, “awards bait,” depending on who you talk to. And Crowley knows how to frame a shot, as he demonstrated in the excellent film “Brooklyn,” which was released in 2011. Ultimately, however, the desperate grandiosity of “The Goldfinch” renders it sterile, robbing the story of its humanity and the audience’s ability to empathize with the characters’ traumas. Under the surface of this soulless film, there is nothing to be found.
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There’s a subplot in which Theo learns how to reassemble broken antiques to make them look like they’re brand new once more. Because they aren’t authentic antiques, he is warned by Hobie not to market them as such. They are counterfeit, manufactured by machines from spare parts and lacking the human touch that distinguishes the genuine article. I’m not aware of any other film that has a better in-story symbol of its own failing than this one.
About the quiz
On September 9, 2019, a review of the Toronto International Film Festival was submitted for publication.Also, you must try to play this The Goldfinch quiz.
For more personality quizzes check this: Arctic Dogs Quiz.
