Started To Make a Good Movie, Then Forgot To

Rating: 4/10 (3 January 2019)

There was parts of this movie that I liked, the acting was really good, the first scene was intense and made me feel the gravity of the situation when I saw those young kids thrust into such an intense and life or death situation. Then they time jump to 5 years earlier and it's pretty much downhill.
The entire concept of multiple story-lines of consecutive events doesn't work because of how you know that everyone is going to die except Sandra Bullock because the movie shows you that. You have no reason to be attached to these characters because you know they'll die at some point soon.
The should've put the focus more on the relationship between Sandra Bullock and the kids, because the entire river plot line in just a metaphor for motherhood after all. They could've given the kids actual personalities and possibly had an interesting dynamic of how the girl's relationship with Sandra Bullock and the boy is affected by her 'mom' clearly disliking her (or at least liking her less).
Bird Box also wasn't shot well. I don't mean it was bad, it just felt pretty bland and uninspired. Even "The Quiet Place" had more creative cinematography.
These are definitely not my only complaints but I feel the others are mostly just nitpicking.
Overall, I felt that it was an okay movie that had unused potential. I don't think the director was right for this, she hasn't done anything of this sort before (as far as I can tell, I may be wrong) and I feel that her style did not fit. The writer's should've stayed closer to the book's plot because the book was much better.