The Painted Bird

Jerzy Kosinki’s 1965 novel, The Painted Bird has long been considered  un-filmable.  It’s a bleak, dark, heart wrenching tale that takes place at the tail end of World War II and see great violence visited upon a child.

Vaclav Marhoul has brought the tale to the screen. The early reviews are very strong, but audiences are apparently fleeing in droves from screenings. It sound like this one is very hard to take.

Here’s the trailer. See if you think you’ll be up to the challenge.

Harvey Keitel, Stellan Skarsgard, Udo Kier, and Barry Pepper star in this film from IFC films. It hits theaters on April 17.