Castle in the Ground (2019) Review

This journey of addiction is one that should not be overlooked. The movie begins with introducing Henry, the main character, who takes care of his sick and dying mother. It seems that his life now revolves around the care of his mother as he often will skip out on social events to be by her side. I would argue that this is his own addiction as it seems that he chooses to let his care take priority over everything else.

It is in this introduction that you learn about his mother’s own addiction to substances as she starts to ask for more and more medication. You are also introduced to Ana, who moves in across the hall to disrupt the routine that he has established with his mother. Ana is new, exciting, different and it provides him a nice change of pace. It is only after his mother’s death that Henry’s relationship with Ana starts to develop. And through this friendship, so does his fall into addiction.

This movie does a great job depicting the loneliness of addiction. I would argue that Ana and Henry aren’t really friends but more using buddies. The same would go for Ana and the people who come by because although they hangout, the only tangible connection they hold is the pills they use to get high. Ana goes even as far as to guilt the people around her in order to receive her next score. Addiction is an incredibly selfish and lonely disease. Once Henry becomes an addict, he stops praying and begins to isolate from anyone from his sober life. Once deep into his addiction, the only people who are in his life are those who have gotten him into trouble. It seems he also becomes addicted to this life because despite having chances to live a normal life, the addiction won’t let him.

Instead, like the other addicts in the movie, he is forever chasing the last high before he can get his shit together. When they finally hit bottom, most addicts do, you can feel the desperation, loneliness, selfishness, and pain of being too deep into an addiction. They no longer care about real problems, nor the consequences of their actions as long as they can get high just one more time.

This decent into the madness that addiction is definitely worth the watch. It is a little slow, but I thought the pace was perfect. It is a good movie adaptation of addiction and how easily someone can fall into it.