Dead Birds – 2004
Posted by Scott on 30 Oct 2008 at 01:31 am | Tagged as: Overlooked Films
Shocktober wouldn’t be complete without a haunted house movie. Creaking doors, mysterious footsteps, ghostly apparitions are all staples of this sub-genre of horror. It’s very easy to mess up these kinds of flicks. Endure the awful House on Haunted Hill series and you’ll know what I mean. One of the best haunted house films isn’t even classified as horror, but rather science-fiction. Alien is about seven people trapped in a confined space, in this case a spaceship, with a strange being that goes largely unseen. Dead Birds isn’t in the class of Alien, but it is a damn scary story that was ignored a few years back.
In 1863, a gang of former confederate soldiers pulls off a bloody bank heist. Carrying a booty of gold the robbers stop at an abandoned Alabama plantation to spend the night before crossing the border into Mexico. The group of six take refuge inside the house to wait out an approaching thunderstorm. The leader of the pack, William, retires to an upstairs bedroom with gal pal Annabelle, while the rest of the crew play cards and swap tales. Things take an eerie turn after one of the men discovers strange dog-like footprints in one of the rooms. Shortly after another of the gang disappears while putting the horses into the barn. As the storm nears a frightening force grips the house and all its residents.
The odd goings-ons make William question his trust of the others. He’s determined to keep the gold safe from greedy hands. Meanwhile, visions of sickly children and bound slave girls begin to haunt Annabelle and the rest. The visions reveal a ghastly past and make the gang realize it would be prudent to leave this forsaken place. The longer they stay the more real the sightings become. Something horrific is stalking the robbers one by one. Will they escape in time or will they succumb to the terrifying entity that permeates this desolate estate?
The Civil War setting makes this film more compelling. I’m not even sure why, but if it took place in present day I don’t think it would work. The location and set design is fantastic. A creepy dwelling is integral in a haunted house movie and the plantation chosen meets that criteria. The creature effects are solid, even though they are directly borrowed from The Ring and The Grudge. A credible cast features Henry Thomas, Patrick Fugit, Nicki Aycox and Isaiah Washington. Dead Birds is perfect viewing for a rainy autumn night. It won’t cause you to lose any sleep but it has enough scares to make the hair on your arms stand at attention the next time your bedroom door closes by itself.
The trailer for Dead Birds:
