We often talk casually about childhood, girlhood, young adulthood, as if they were monolithic experiences; it’s only when they are reflected back at us, especially in the movies, that we see how many different shades of childhood there are, as distinctive as the individuals soldiering through them. In Andrea Arnold’s tender, bracing Bird—playing in competition at the Cannes Film Festival—12-year old Bailey (Nikiya Adams) lives with her father Bug (Barry Keoghan, of The Banshees of Inisherin and Saltburn) and older brother Hunter (Jason Buda) in a squat in Kent, the kind of down-at-the-heels house that should be depressing but somehow isn’t. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] The walls of Bailey’s bedroom are painted with vines and leaves; butterflies occasionally enter through the open window for a visit.