Don't listen to the usual critical establishment: John Crowley & Peter Straughan's adaptation of THE GOLDFINCH proves rich, joyous, artful and moving storytelling

"I can't believe they did it!" raved my spouse as we left the local theater where THE GOLDFINCH has recently opened. Spousie had read the novel a few years back, loved it, and had looked forward ever since to a possible movie version. TrustMovies himself had never read the book and so sat down to view the film as a clean slate. He, too, loved it -- swept away within the opening moments and held fast throughout the two-and-one-half-hours of crackerjack storytelling, wonderful performances, and the most artful melding of past and present, youth and adulthood, time periods, places and -- most important -- that very difficult transition of loss and grief into understanding. Not to mention the uses and importance of art.

Every movie that director John Crowley (shown at right) has so far made is a good one -- from Intermission and Boy A through Is Anybody There?, Closed Circuit and the especially wonderful Brooklyn. And now he has given us what is certainly his most ambitious work and one that, I believe, will hold up beautifully and should have future audiences asking, "How in hell did this one go so unappreciated?"

Interestingly, each of Crowley's six films is in a different genre. He never repeats, and yet each takes its particular genre and lifts it quite nicely. The man is not a writer, but damned if he does not recognize a first-class story -- as well as the way to best bring it to life.

What is so funny -- surprising, rather than hilarious -- is that in the case of The Goldfinch (very well adapted by Peter Straughan from the popular novel by Donna Tartt), were you asked to give a precis of this story, you would be very hard put to do so. It's about so many people and so many things and events. Ms Tartt evidently knew just how to pull the reader into her complex tale, and so, film-wise, does the Crowley/Straughan duo.

The main event in all this the filmmakers do not allow us to see, except in small pieces, throughout their movie. It's major, though, and awful, leading to the kind of loss that can never be patched. Various characters deal with this loss in differing ways, and while it is loss and grief that bind the movie, so fascinating is the story and the characters who fill it that instead of becoming a some kind of "downer," the movie end up lifting us in rather remarkable ways.

The heavy lifting may be done by the filmmakers and Ms Tartt, but the marvelous cast assembled here certainly does its part, too.  The major roles of Theo Decker and his bizarre Russian friend, Boris, are taken by (in adulthood) Ansel Elgort and Aneurin Barnard (above, right and left, respectively) and in childhood by Oakes Fegley (at right, two photos up) and Finn Wolfhard. Each actor is not only exceedingly good, but each also makes a fine older or younger version of himself.

The distaff side is equally well represented by the likes of Nicole Kidman (above), Sarah Paulson (shown at bottom, left), Willa Fitzgerald and Ashley Cummings (below), and again, each is precisely on the mark. Crowley has always been terrific with actors, especially in his understanding of just how hard or soft to go with the various important moments. Here, he hits everyone of them with grace and ease

Crowley and Straughan (along with cinematographer Roger Deakins and editor Kelley Dixon)  understand how to create important moments of transition regarding events, characters and moods without ever once hitting us over the head. Demeaning critics have referred to this movie as "flat." Which makes me wonder how any intelligent, genuinely watchful viewer could confuse flatness with artfulness and subtlety?

Well, see for yourself, my friends, as this crackerjack tale moves from New York City to Las Vegas to Amsterdam and back. Along with everything else that's so fine here, the film's last visual is spectacular: Simplicity itself, it unites present and past with a poignancy in which all seems perfection and the best is yet to come. For that moment, at least. (Below, right, is Luke Wilson, with Ms Paulson, who brings new meaning to the term bad dad.)

Distributed via Warner Brothers (with Amazon involved in its financing), The Goldfinch has opened this past week, nationwide. If you love a good story told artfully and beautifully, give it a whirl. Click here to find the theater(s) nearest you.