I love the duality of how Tinja, as a young girl and gymnast, is supposed to be sweet on the outside but vicious on the inside. When I watched the movie, I wondered why the writer decided to use birds to represent this, but I guess it's because we tend to use birds as symbols of freedom. Light and delicate, they're able to defy gravity and soar in the endless sky above us. We associate that kind of freedom with youth too, yet Tinja is caged by her overbearing mother, both physically in the home and emotionally with the secrets she's forced to keep. There's something profoundly sad in a parent intentionally clipping her child's wings, so to speak.
That's an excellent point that I didn't even think about. The symbolism/metaphors are really great in this film, and it was definitely worth another watch to see them clearer.
I love the duality of how Tinja, as a young girl and gymnast, is supposed to be sweet on the outside but vicious on the inside. When I watched the movie, I wondered why the writer decided to use birds to represent this, but I guess it's because we tend to use birds as symbols of freedom. Light and delicate, they're able to defy gravity and soar in the endless sky above us. We associate that kind of freedom with youth too, yet Tinja is caged by her overbearing mother, both physically in the home and emotionally with the secrets she's forced to keep. There's something profoundly sad in a parent intentionally clipping her child's wings, so to speak.
That's an excellent point that I didn't even think about. The symbolism/metaphors are really great in this film, and it was definitely worth another watch to see them clearer.