Bird Box: I Will Never Understand How People Loved This Movie

Who here remembers "Bird Box?" Released on Netflix back in 2018, I can perfectly understand how it got so popular. It had a relatively unique premise and a simple yet effective name that got it bumped way up in the search algorithm. People went crazy for this movie. For several months, the only movie that got recommended to me was "Bird Box." However, I skipped it and only came back to it in college, where I watched it with a buddy. And after I finished it, I had exactly one question: "how did people love this movie so much?" And I will admit, this movie contains two of the three essential ingredients for a good movie: characters with universal motivations and a unique enough concept, but what it possesses in assets, it completely and utterly fumbles in execution. "Bird Box" is a cliche-ridden, half-hearted, poorly-written, self-serious, and poorly-plotted movie that writes itself into corners, relies on cliches rather than on characters, and effectively splits itself into two movies rather than allowing itself to flow along at a reasonable, intelligent, and single-minded pace. In short, "Bird Box" had all the necessary tools and none of the necessary skills required to use them. The saddest thing is that this movie does use its concept of not safely being able to look at the apocalyptic creatures in question to good effect, utilizing touches like a school of the blind turning out to be a safe haven. But, all in all, this movie is a prime case of "good concept, poor execution."

"Bird Box" follows a woman named Malorie and her two children as they navigate a post-apocalyptic world inhabited by beings that cause you to commit suicide if you look at them. Because you can't look at these beings without dying, you have to cover your eyes whenever going outdoors. And on paper, this concept sounds fine, even great. However, the execution of this idea is majorly lacking. I'll start by saying this: I only summarized half of the movie for you. The other half of the movie is a sequence dedicated to the first few days of the outbreak. In short, the movie splits itself in half, unmistakably disrupting its narrative flow. It doesn't help that the first half of the movie isn't very strong either. It's filled to the brim with a bunch of poorly written and patently stupid people hiding from the beings in a house (Malorie gets a pass from this critique. Sandra Bullock did a good job with the character). These characters felt much less like people and far more like stereotypes that had been introduced to the story because it needed something to make it actually exist. Not once did I care about what happened to them because the movie never gave me a reason to. The occasional flash-forwards don't help either. They more or less let us know who lives and who dies before the film even gets to that point, further keeping me from becoming invested in characters where doing that is already hard enough. "Bird Box" was far more enamored with its concept than it was with its characters, and whenever you lose sight of character development and creating real stakes, you lose. In true poor execution fashion, this could have, in theory, been an excellent movie had the filmmakers invested their time into giving each of the characters a distinct voice, especially because the performances are, at worst, somewhat serviceable and, at best, good. It could have been "Knives Out" with monsters. However, I couldn't tell you anything about these characters other than that they fit what can be best described as the required teen drama stereotypes.

You have the spiritually in-tune character who gives out vague expository sentences here and there. You have the two married couples who are sadly indistinguishable from each other because the writers don't care about them. And you had literal Machine Gun Kelly and his girlfriend, who have nothing better to do than have sex in the pantry and be a liability until they finally decide to leave the group because the writers desperately want them out of the story so they don't have to drag the weight anymore. This movie is trying to be a character-driven story, but the fact of the matter is that you run into problems with a character-driven formula when your characters are shallow, uncreative, and boring. That said, the acting in "Bird Box" was far from terrible, but when you have a screenplay that doesn't give you much to work with, you're still fighting a losing battle. I will say that once the movie jumps forward in time to its second act, which follows Malorie and her children (very creatively named "Boy" and "Girl") as they try to reach a safe community to warn them of the creatures, it's execution is better than before. This part of the film was more stripped down, free of the over-abundance of supporting characters, and should have been the focus of the entire movie. The first half of this film accomplished nothing except laying out exposition that could have and should have been delivered via world details in the second half. This latter half of "Bird Box" feels like it's moving towards a tangible goal, following a foray to find a safe haven that turns out to be a literal school for the blind, who are safe from the effects of the creatures for obvious reasons. If the entire movie had been about Malorie and her children's journey through the forest, this could have been a movie I could get behind enough to not bash it over the head with my criticism wand. But it's not. "Bird Box" is two movies, one serviceable and the other an hour of cliche-ridden misery. A lot of people seemed to take issue with the movie's lack of a thorough explanation as to why the monsters function the way they do, and personally, I do have to give the movie points for not feeling the need to fully flesh that out. If the characters don't understand them, why should we feel the need to? The movie didn't need to explain why the monsters cause people to do what they do. All we need to know is that they do, and I appreciate the filmmakers for realizing this. But maybe this is just me giving the movie pity points.

"Bird Box" is a poorly executed, plot-hole-ridden, two-part teen drama about largely cliche-ridden and poorly-written characters. It tries to do a lot more than it needs to without ever knowing how. And because it doesn't know how it accomplishes very little. I must say, I felt very let down after watching the movie. It seemed, at least at the time of its release, that everyone loved it, so naturally, I felt a little disappointed that this movie dropped the ball. But it is what it is. If you're into movies about monsters that hurt you because of one or more of your basic senses, I would recommend "A Quiet Place." That movie avoided every pitfall that "Bird Box" unfortunately stepped into.

Bird Box - 5/10

Luke 6:39-40