Watch the Trailer for ‘The Goldfinch,’ a Hotly Anticipated Coming-of-Age Saga That Kicks Off With a Bombing at the Met

The film based on Dona Tartt's Pulitzer Prize-winning book stars Ansel Elgort and Nicole Kidman.

Nicole Kidman and Ansel Elgort in The Goldfinch. Photo by Macall Polay, courtesy of Warner Bros. Studio.

The trailer has dropped for the highly anticipated film adaptation of Donna Tartt’s bestselling novel The Goldfinch. The sprawling coming-of-age story centers on a young boy, Theodore Decker, who survives terrorist attack at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, but unwittingly becomes an art thief in the process.

The winner of the 2014 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, The Goldfinch takes its title from the Carel Fabritius painting of the same name, a gem of Dutch Golden Age painting. In novel and film alike, the tiny canvas is Theo’s mother’s favorite work of art. In the chaotic aftermath of the tragic bombing that takes her life, he ends up absconding from the ashes of the museum, painting in tow.

The trailer cuts back and forth between the immediate aftermath of the attack and Theo’s adult life, battling substance abuse. In a particularly vivid image, you see him covered in ashes, except for his Met admission pin (which marks the film as being set in an earlier time period, as the Met switched to stickers from the clip-on buttons in 2013, and changed its logo in 2016).

Screen capture from <em>The Goldfinch</em> trailer, with Metropolitan Museum of Art admission badge highlighted.

Screen capture from The Goldfinch trailer, with Metropolitan Museum of Art admission badge highlighted.

As he comes to terms with his shock and grief, Theo slowly comes to realize the magnitude of what he has done, and is wracked by guilt, looking to escape a web of lies.

Warner Brothers Pictures bought the movie rights to the story in 2014. The film is directed by John Crowley, of the Academy Award-nominated Brooklyn (2015). It stars Ansel Elgort—of The Fault in Our Stars and the Divergent film series, both adaptations of young adult novels—as Theo. Other roles are played by Nicole Kidman, Luke Wilson, Sarah Paulson, and Jeffrey Wright, who played the title role in Julian Schnabel’s 1996 film Basquiat.

Dona Tartt, <em>The Goldfinch</em>. Courtesy of Little, Brown and Company.

Dona Tartt, The Goldfinch. Courtesy of Little, Brown and Company.

The Goldfinch is set to hit theaters September 13, 2019. In the meantime, you can buy the book, or see the titular painting at the Mauritshuis Museum in the Hague in the Netherlands.

Watch the trailer for the film below.


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