If you tell me you’ve watched a strange, weird movie, you’ve got my attention.
“The Nest” is an independent film, written, directed, and produced by Sean Durkin, and premiered in 2020 at the Sundance Film Festival. I just watched it on Netflix, after a friend described it as strange and weird. Instead, I found it beautifully crafted and incredibly captivating.
The cinematography creates a perception of a slow movie as the narrative unfolds tumultuously, with events cascading one after another. Time has been deliberately dilated by stretching the silence so that we observe the body language of the characters, discover their inner drama, and hopefully connect with them.
The screenwriting is so powerful, no fluff has been embedded in the direct and straightforward dialogue style, with every single line shooting straight to one’s heart. There’s so much love, pain and suffering in all five main characters, including Richmond, the horse – each expressing their cry for help in their own way.
“The Nest” is a movie about the human striving to reach their ideal self, the inner battle between what one is and what one wants to be, while the past weighs down on the present, impacting oneself and the people around.
It’s about the strong love that all main characters in “the nest” have for each other. It explores the complexity of relationships and warns us that strong love may come with pain and suffering – from not understanding and accepting our differences, from wanting to be loved just the way we are.
The loving, strong, and beautiful wife, mom and horse mom, the loving husband and father, daughter and son, all come together, clash, separate, and come together again, in a continuous loop. The end is open-ended and it was so interesting to read some reviews that assumed the worst.
This film is so rich and layered that my words can’t do it justice. Don’t read the reviews, just watch it. It’s so much more than just a story. I can’t explain the range and depth of emotions I’ve experienced.
Watch it yourself and let me know what you think. And if it doesn’t resonate with you, that’s okay. It simply confirms how different we all are.
I loved it so much that it will go on my list of “movies I love,” on Pinterest. Feel free to check it out and see if you find anything you like.