Bird Box: Worth A Watch
January 22, 2019
By: Susan San
Imagine an outbreak. You look out the window– people are screaming, throwing objects, and crashing their cars into telephone poles. The most chilling part about this whole situation is that it’s caused by merely keeping your eyes open.
Chances are, you’ve heard of the new hit movie Bird Box on Netflix. It’s blown up everywhere on the Internet, with memes and challenges appearing all over social media platforms such as Twitter and Instagram.
To sum up the plot of the film, it starts with a woman named Malorie (Sandra Bullock) and her sister (Sarah Paulson) driving through the street when suddenly, chaos breaks out and everyone starts to intentionally commit suicide in many different, violent ways. We realize later on that the reason for this is caused by making eye contact with “evil creatures” in the air, but not much else is known about the details of the creatures. The reason why Malorie, as opposed to her sister, survives, is because she is pregnant. She finds a group of people inside a house and seeks shelter there.
The movie cuts back and forth from current time to past. The current time is Malorie on a canoe with her two children, Boy and Girl, attempting a journey to find a safe place. The past time shows the struggles that Malorie and the group of people in the house face as they try to avoid contact with the “evil creatures.”
Like many new and popular shows and movies, much controversy has risen since its release, mainly due to its ending. Because the producer of the movie, Susanne Bier, adapted it from Josh Malerman’s novel, she had tweaked the plot’s ending to be more optimistic. Critics claim that it would have been a much better film had it stuck with the book’s ending. The book ends with the main character Malorie and her two children reaching a society where everyone has purposefully blinded themselves in order to survive, which is rather dark. The film ends with the family finding a safe haven, a home for people who were already blind and survived. Personally, I do not think this change was drastic enough to cause people to be upset. It is basically the same ending, just slightly less grim.
It’s a scary thought to think about an apocalypse happening around you, out of your control. This movie was thought-provoking and able to keep me on the edge of my seat all the way throughout. The action-packed beginning hooked me as a viewer and kept me pining for more.
One noteworthy mention about the film is the fact that Netflix themselves tweeted out a disclaimer due to the overwhelming increase in “Bird Box challenges” across the media. The tweet stated: “Can’t believe I have to say this, but: PLEASE DO NOT HURT YOURSELVES WITH THIS BIRD BOX CHALLENGE. We don’t know how this started, and we appreciate the love, but Boy and Girl have just one wish for 2019 and it is that you not end up in the hospital due to memes.” It was smart of Netflix to do this since they don’t need a lawsuit coming their way any time soon, not to mention pretty hilarious.
I would personally give this movie a rating of four stars out of five. Although it’s a thrilling film, the fact that we, as watchers, never get a real answer as to what the “creatures” are and where they came from, really impairs the plot. I want a sequel, but I’m afraid that the producers would drag out the idea way too far. Everything else was great, from some of the tear-jerking scenes to the scary and intense scenes of Malorie and her children running away from evil. Sandra Bullock really outdid herself with her amazing acting skills in this one, in my own opinion.
Sources:
