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Based on the Pulitzer-bait tome from Donna Tart, a film about a boy whose mother dies in a terrorist attack at the Met. Starring Oakes Fegley, also notable is the romance between Oakes' character and his friend portrayed by F. Wolfhard, who share a kiss in the trailer.

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hosenhaus wrote on 05. Oct 2019 at 19:46:


Now this is an interesting question. When a movie is based on a book, should one read the book first, or watch the movie first?

I read Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game before viewing the movie, and I found the movie somewhat disappointing because of it. It occurred to me at the time that I can never now have the experience of viewing the film having not read the novel, and I think I would have enjoyed the movie more if I had watched it without all the extra knowledge that the novel supplies, and which must inevitably be omitted in a film.

In the case of "The Goldfinch" the bad reviews seem to be from reviewers familiar with the novel. I think familiarity with the novel detracts from one's ability to view the film as a artistic work in its own right, which needs to be judged on its own merits. After all, a film is a very different artistic medium to a novel.

So nowadays I think it better to just watch the movie, and then to only go on to read the novel if one finds the movie particularly personally meaningful and wants to explore its themes in greater depth, but otherwise not to bother.

I was surprised to see that after 3 weekends, there's now only one or two theaters playing this in a 50 mile radius. I planned to go this weekend but not worth the commute.

The novel is something like 700+ pages and probably meant to be read over the course of months, hard to pack  everything into a 2hr film. At any rate, I'm sure that soon enough there will be many copies of the DVD on the library shelves.

Very good movie ! Oakes FEGLEY have a very good play !

You can now watch the film for free on Prime Video.