First time to do a film “review” (naks). So bear with me…

So yes, I have watched Birdbox and yes I liked it. Yes similar nga sila ng A Quiet Place in the sense that it is treated in a post apocalyptic way and has a pregnant woman in the leading role. The movie stars Sandra Bullock as Malorie who doesn’t fail to deliver a performance of a single mom struggling for survival with 2 kids (whom she calls boy and girl) against a monster that causes you to kill yourself when you see it and against a group of lunatics who are evangelists of these creatures whose main goal is also for you to see it and kill yourself. (So ang goal nila mamatay ka) thus, the blindfold to stop you from seeing the monster.

The film is made with cuts of Malorie and the 2 kids on their way to a hidden shelter and of flashbacks providing a backstory and the evolution of Malorie’s character and why she is alone with the 2 kids. She started of being detached with responsibility and care with the people around her and ended up caring for other people.

Here are some thoughts (without spoilers) about the movie:

1- We (mankind) have the capacity to destroy ourselves. Interestingly enough the ‘selling point’ of the creatures to drive people to suicide is something that they love or they long for. It shows the reality that a desire put in a wrong way has the capacity to destroy us. We are indeed all broken people able to destroy ourselves and others apart from God’s grace.

2- Hope is important. Believing in something is important. There is a scene where Malorie tries to stop the kids from hearing a hopeful story because she finds this useless with their goal to survive. But she eventually changed her perspective and realized that surviving is not the same as living. Hope and a vision of a better world should not be removed from us even in the middle of evil. It is so easy for us to just focus on problems, pain and the realities of life that when we hear hopeful stories we shrug them off as wishful thinking, or view it as lies. We may be surviving but not living.

“Life is more than what it is, it is what it could be…” is one of the quotes I liked from the movie.

Keep hoping, do not shrug off a vision of a better world nor dismiss it as naivete but as hope. In a world that laughs at faith, this movie reminds us that faith and hope is a basic need for life and very much relevant in our time.

3- Family is important. As the kids grow up the protection that Malorie and Tom (the father figure played by Trevante Rhodes) is crucial for the safety of the kids. Family doesn’t just provide protection, it nurtures, it gives vision and has the capacity to shape the next generation. 

4- Crises change us, sometimes for the better or for the worse. Problems and challenges does something in us that develops or degrades us. It is how we respond to situations that happen to us that makes an impact. Malorie was a different person at the end of the movie through all the things she gained and lost.

Birdbox is not just random violence but a story of how hope and vision and how it goes beyond seeing what is in front of us. Faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. Hope anchors our hearts sot hat we can go on even if there are so many loss and destruction around us.

I’ll give this one an 8/10.