Dead Birds (2004)

When a group of criminals on the run after a bank robbery take refuge in an abandoned house, they have no idea what evil they have come upon. Isolated and presumed deserted, the house is anything but safe...As the night wears on and a thunderstorm grows outside, each member of the group begins to have visions of the atrocities that occurred within the house, haunting it forever. Voices in the well, visions of mangled bodies and clawing under the stairs plague their waking hours. As the fear in the group begins to grow and the supernatural forces in the house start to manifest themselves, the group turn on each other and exact the wrath of the soul trapped within the walls.

Watch carefully.... VERY cool easter eggs! (no spoilers)

(no spoilers here)

This movie is so creepy. I notice the other reviewers have used the same word. This makes it different from several other horror movies, in that it does not rely on blood and guts to get under your skin. It does it by using your mind against you.

The movie takes place in a time-period not normally picked for horror movies. This ups the ante for a 5-star rating, just for being different.

The acting is good, adding a woman and a free black man gives a twist. Then you have good and bad guys w/in the same group. Excellent to watch it unfold.

'Hidden easter eggs' abound. Watch the mirrors in backgrounds and freeze-frames on quickly opening doors. I missed these until someone told me... and WOW!

Slowly, the viewer comes to the recognition that something else is happening besides the place being haunted and even why, and that 'something' rocks the movie on the creepiness scale.

Buy this if you can. It is one to watch over and over, because it's a smart one. June 22, 2008

the worst Horror movie ever

boring! And what is happening? Nothing. Tese people go into that house and the whole time they are looking in the rooms and searching around the house but nothing happens. Some people disappear, that`s all. Don`t buy it. Go for The (NEW) Hills have eyes or saw but forget about this one. June 15, 2008

Thrushed into the Limelight.....(!)

`Dead Birds' is an interesting and unpredictable horror movie. It's a haunted house thriller, with ambivalent twists and turns and a cock-sure sturdy ambiguous ending. It's well acted by a cast of (to me!) unknowns, has scary effects and drips with American Civil War sweaty intensity.
The characters are unsympathetic. The `hero' kills a child in the `Wild Bunch' style opening scene, and thereby opens the obligatory can of worms without whose opening, nothing in a horror movie can happen.
`Dead Birds' is bit like Ken Russell's `Gothic' in a sense. A brigade of strung-out desperadoes, stranded in a stormy old mansion, trying to differentiate between what's real, and what's an extension of their own particular hidden insecurities and terrors.
While Russell's film is more oblique, the dangers the protagonists face are generally harmless in a physical sense, in `Dead birds' they're very real. And just as in `Gothic', the building itself is the true embodiment and personification of the evil the fragile, injured souls must face head on.
It's directed by some-one called Alex Turner, hardly a name to get the gore-hounds salivating, but on this showing, some-one with something resembling honest affection and respect for the genre. He handles the action well, keeps the frenzy and hysteria in check and isn't frightened of cliché or homage. Turner throws anything and everything at his film, see's what sticks, then edits and prints. It works for him, `Dead Birds' is spooky, bloody and suspenseful, and it's not every schlocker which can boast all three attributes.
`Dead Birds' is a good, strong beast, fattened by the spirits of Peckinpah and early Carpenter, brought to the table in perfect health, and then had it's throat slashed before your very eyes.
Definitely something to crow about.......




May 24, 2008

Scattershot...some buckshot hits its target. 2.5 stars

Not too bad for a low-budget flick. It does have its share of atmosphere, the Civil War/Western side is a nice touch.

The problem for me was the murky development of the storyline explaining the demonic forces at the Colonial Mansion. The whirlwind culmination of events once the background story was revealed left me wanting.

There is an all-to-brief expositional mishmash of what the demonic creatures are and who and how they orchestrate events? Everything "ghost-like" (in the traditional sense) attempt to explain how the demons' came into this world but any further info is not forthcoming.
Symbolic pointers are present with the scarecrow and dead bird for example, but nothing really ties it into the story (even their significance is questionable). The viewer has the bulk of loose ends to connect, such as they are.

Prime example is the ultimate fate of the last robber/leader. Who, or better yet, what was he? If he was the robber/leader we followed through the movie than when did he become like the demon-thing?

So, for all the decent low-budget atmosphere there still remains the feeling that the viewer got shortchanged. Only a few pellets actually hit the intended target (ie you), and the damage is very non-lethal.

If you enjoy atmosheric horror with a strong touch of Americana check out 'Ravenous', that's my sure bet. April 29, 2008

Suprisingly Great Film!

I didn't know what to expect when first I watched this film. I was impressed by the low-key acting through the first of the film. This helped set an eerie tone for the rest of it. The kids were truly horrifying and the way they were shot, I about jumped out of my skin. Had to pause and step forward to get a good look at them. Even the end was tolerable. A rare thing in these kinds of films. March 29, 2008

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