directed by Andrea Arnold
Recently, I was travelling a bit and ended up in a lovely city of Rijeka in Croatia. And could a cinephile like me skip visiting a local cinema? Absolutely not! So I went to see “Bird” there and left amazed by the gorgeous cinema, but also mind-blown by the story I watched. At the end of the post I’ll share my personal interpretation, so there will be some spoilers, but I’m sharing them hoping one of you shares their point of view. Because this film can be understood in so many way, which is one of its advantages. We get to meet Bailey (Nykiya Adams), a 12-year-old girl struggling with her everyday life. She lives with her father Bug (Barry Keoghan) and her half brother Hunter (Jason Buda) in a squat. Bug had his children very young, so he’s also not a very much of a grown-up man – he likes to drink, snif some illegal stuff and have fun. His children generally raise themselves, although from time to time he likes to remind them that he’s the boss of the house. Bailey seems to be a very reasonable teenager, but incredibly lost. She keeps looking for her identity, but the environment she lives and grows up in doesn’t help. Her mother lives with an abusive partner, so Bailey often visits them to take care of her younger siblings. One day, she meets Bird (Franz Rogowski), an outsider, who could be described as the most genuine person you can imagine. He doesn’t want to fit in and doesn’t care about other people’s opinions, he has so much appreciation towards the world and sees beauty in literally everything. At first Bailey is quite distant with the man, but the more time they spend together, the greater connection they have. And here stops the recommendation part – now I’m moving to my interpretation so SPOILERS are coming. I’ve checked some reviews and a lot of people struggle to decide whether Bird was a real person or some kind of a mystical figure. My theory says – Bird is the personification of what Bailey isn’t, but deep inside she wishes to become. She wants to be more of a free spirit with a peaceful mind, but there are too many problems in her life. Bird says he doesn’t know his parents, so Bailey is helping him to find them. In my opinion, this is a metaphor of Bailey searching for her “dream parents”, because her actual ones are nothing a caretaker should be. When Bird fails to “rebuild” his family, this is the moment when Bailey realises that she’s definitely alone in this world and has to deal with everything herself, not hoping any of those two would change. Another thing – remember the most controversial scene where Bird actually changes into a bird and fights with Bailey’s mother’s partner? That scene is so unrealistic and completely not fitting to the rest of the film. In my opinion, it’s because this scene is simply a hypothetical situation that could have happened. So, when one day Bailey visits her mother, the mother’s partner becomes very aggressive and says he’ll hurt them all. I believe he actually did. He killed the whole family, so when Bailey returns to an empty house – that’s the picture telling us he actually killed them all. When the children, the mother and the partner appear, that’s all in Bailey’s head. She’s imagining a better scenario that could have happened if only she’d had some unrealistically powerful skills. She would have saved the family. That’s why the dog is back to life – it’s all in the girl’s head, but in fact, the whole family was murdered. If I’m breaking your heart right now, I’m sorry, but that’s my personal interpretation. And the ending – I was thinking about the fox for a long time, and I actually have an idea. So Bailey understood that she cannot become Bird, her imaginary person-to-be, no matter how much she wishes that. She gives Bird a hug, accepting the reality and then the fox appears – symbolising her new path. She accepts her life, her background and her limits and from now on she’s more aware of who she is as Bailey. If this interpretation seems like a rollercoaster that lost its track and is somewhere around the planet Saturn – I’m fine with it, but it’s what I like to believe happened in the film. I really hope you have your own interpretations and if not, please watch this production and get inspired.
My rating: 8/10
S.
I have nothing to watch 