Bird Box

Rating: 6/10 (8 August 2019)

A Quiet Place was a brilliant scary movie that used the sense of sound, or rather sensory deprivation, to create fear, this Netflix produced film does almost the same thing, using the sense of sight, directed by Susanne Bier (Serena, The Night Manager). Basically, in a post-apocalyptic world, Malorie Hayes (Sandra Bullock) tells two young children, known only as Boy (Julian Edwards) and Girl (Vivien Lyra Blair), that they will be going downstream on a river in a rowing boat. She strictly instructs them never to remove their blindfolds, or else they will die. Malorie's story goes back and forth in time, separated by five years, until they conjoin: her attempt to navigate the river and the events that led to it. Five years earlier, Malorie is pregnant and visited by her sister Jessica (Sarah Paulson) for a routine check-up in hospital. A new report on television tells of unexplained mass suicides taking place in Romania and spreading across Europe. When leaving the hospital, Malorie sees a woman bashing her head into a glass panel, followed by panic erupting in town. Malorie realises the "violence" has now reached North America, Jessica tries to drive them away from it. But Jessica experiences the phenomenon affecting the masses, she sees an invisible entity, which causes her to lose control, and deliberately cause the car to crash. An injured Malorie witnesses Jessica walk into the path of an oncoming truck, killing herself. Malorie runs through the mass chaos on the streets, until a woman named Lydia (Rebecca Pidgeon) invites her into her house for safety, even though her husband Douglas (John Malkovich) disagrees. But as she does so, Lydia goes into a trance, begins talking to her dead mother, and casually climbs into a burning car, which explodes. Malorie is rescued and brought into the house by Tom (Moonlight's Trevante Rhodes). One of the survivors, Charlie (Get Out's Lil Rel Howery), has somewhat comprehensive knowledge of what could be happening. He theorises that demonic entities have invaded Earth, taking the form of their victims' worst fears and traumas, driving them insane before causing them to commit suicide. At the insistence of Tom, they cover all windows in the house and blindfold themselves whenever they must venture outside. Later, Greg (Jurassic Park's BD Wong) volunteers to tie himself to a chair while monitoring the surveillance cameras to find evidence of the entity, he falls victim after seeing it and kills himself by rocking his chair violently and slamming his head into a hearthstone. The group are soon joined by new survivor Olympia (Danielle Macdonald), who is also pregnant, and they find that supply of food is decreasing. Using masking tape and the satellite navigation, most of the group drive to the supermarket where Charlie worked to restock. Malorie finds pet birds and decides to take them along with their supplies. Charlie hears a co-worker begging for help, he accidentally causes himself to get locked outside with him, the group contemplate helping him, but Malorie notices the birds going into a hysterical fury. The group is attacked by the infected co-worker, he was not killed by the entities but is instead used to infect others. Charlie sacrifices himself to save the others, who are able to make it back safely to the house. Sometime later, fellow survivors Felix (rapper Machine Gun Kelly, aka Colson Baker) and Lucy (Alita: Battle Angel's Rosa Salazar) steal the car and drive away. Later, Olympia lets stranger and apparent lone survivor Gary (Tom Hollander) into the house, although Douglas objects. Douglas gets extremely upset and threatens the others with a shotgun, he is knocked unconscious by elderly survivor Cheryl (Jacki Weaver) and imprisoned in the garage. Later, Olympia and Malorie go into labour, and Cheryl helps with the births. Gary starts drawing various entities and goes into a trance, indicating that he was already partially overtaken by the entity when he arrived. He opens the garage door to kill Douglas. He peeks outside and is completely taken over; he then knocks out Tom and proceeds to remove all the coverings from all the windows. Despite Malorie's warnings, Olympia fails to look away from the windows, is overtaken by the entity and jumps out of the window. Gary forces Cheryl to look, she is also overtaken and grabs a pair of scissors to stab herself in the neck. Douglas blindly attempts to kill Gary with a shotgun but fails, Gary kills him stabbing him the scissors. Malorie tries to protect the new-born babies, her boy and Olympia's girl, Tom recovers consciousness in time to overpower and kill Gary. Five years later, Tom and Malorie are living together with the children. They receive a transmission from Rick (Pruitt Taylor Vince), a survivor stating that they are well and safe at a community hidden in the forest. The four decide to go to the community but are ambushed by a group of infected survivors along the way. Tom tries to distract the group, while Malorie and the children make an escape, but the group notice them. Tom sacrifices himself, opening his eyes to shoot the group dead, he is then overtaken by one of the entities, he is able to shoot the last member of the group before shooting himself. Malorie, the children, and the pet birds, kept in a cardboard box to protect them, make their way blindfolded down the river in a boat. On the way, they fight off an infected survivor, and survive raging rapids. The boat is overtaken by the rough water, but Malorie, Boy and Girl are able to find each other. The three are separated when Malorie accidentally slips down a hill. Voices of the entities, pretending to be Malorie, attempt to convince Boy and Girl to remove their blindfolds. Malorie is able to tell them to fight the urge. Once reunited again, they are chased by the entity, implied by invisible forces (wind) moving through the trees. Malorie and the children eventually reach the community, a former school for the blind. Malorie releases the pet birds from the box to the other birds up on the ceiling, she knows they have found somewhere to settle, and finally gives the children names: Tom and Olympia. Also starring Parminder Nagra as Dr. Lapham, and Frank Mottek as News Anchor. Bullock is terrific as the leading heroine, Rhodes is likeably charismatic, Malkovich does his usual scathing thing, and other supporting cast members, Howery and Weaver, do alright as well. It is a high-concept tale, mysterious creatures who, once glimpsed, causing them to commit suicide or become homicidal psychopaths, there are a good amount of shocks and eerie moments, I agree it is not as inventive as A Quiet Place (released the same year), but it is a most worthwhile post-apocalyptic science-fiction horror thriller. Good!