DVD REVIEW: DEAD BIRDS

The Flick

It's 1863. A group of Confederate deserters rides into a small Alabama town, following the trail of an Army gold deposit. Within moments, the crew has murdered several people and grabbed bags of gold before riding off into the swamp. Their destination: an abandoned farmhouse once owned by a soldier now dead. Their leader, William (Henry Thomas), bunked next to the guy in a field hospital. The perfect place to hole up before splitting for Mexico.

But arriving at the edge of the property, the group encounters a strange beast, and soon runs afoul of other supernatural emanations within the house. You know -- ghost kids, visions of bound slaves and men without skin. (No lament configuration necessary.) Internal squabbling splits the loose-knit group into greedy factions, and then the disappearances start.

While the jury deliberated, Michael Jackson relaxed with the bailiffs.

Dead Birds is a slow burn. The action takes place almost entirely in the gloomy, moldering rooms and corridors of the old plantation house. Last year, I made a comparison to The Devil's Backbone (here), but fans of Session 9 will get into the severely aged space, the pacing and the splintering group dynamic.

The group of characters is what really drew me into the film. First-time feature director Alex Turner and his producers assembled a great and varied cast to flesh out the mismatched gang. Henry Thomas makes a surprisingly strong, brooding lead and is backed up by standout work from Isiah Washington as Todd, the guy who gives weight to William's words. Watching Washington, I kept thinking of the great, unshakable Woody Strode. Maybe it was just the hat.

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Mark Boone Jr. and Michael Shannon steal scenes as Joseph and Clyde, the malcontent duo that wants to take their share of the gold, if not all of it, right now. The script doesn't take many chances with them. On paper they're a pretty typical bad/dumb pair. But Boone and Shannon have both the sneer and regular-guy moments to make them memorable. Nikki Aycox (Jeepers Creepers 2 veteran) and Patrick Fugit round out the group, and though they also suffer script anemia, both actors work hard to become more than ciphers, and generally succeed.

Beyond the small ensemble, there's also the overt atmosphere of Asian horror. The CGI creatures are the product of an animation house in Korea, and they bring a non-western influence to the mix. And the cyclical implications of the story, as well as the notion that greed and guilt leave absolutely indelible stains, have much in common with the current Asian horror manifesto. No one's getting away clean here.

Wild Bill vowed never again to attempt opening oysters in the dark.

That's a strong approach -- at least it's my favored approach to horror -- but with watered-down sequels and remakes wearing out the welcome of Asian horror, the tone of Dead Birds now looks like a serious gamble. It succeeds, because while there's a definite nod to that school of ideas, the action here is definitely rooted in the American past. The period setting helps immeasurably; the same story with teens in a haunted house would feel cheap, but here the setting makes the isolated setting and backstory more believable.

And it's marvelously shot, with deep, intense shadows providing perfect ambiance. After over-lit crap like Cursed, it was a pleasure to look at a film that wasn't afraid of the dark. Turner and photographer Steve Yedlin (who partnered on May with production designer Leslie Keel) refuse to linger too long on the creatures and ghosts, with the exception of one backstory montage. While the practical effects almost always work well, some of the CGI does stand out overmuch, but I accept cheap digital just as much as the latex in old Stuart Gordon movies.

Ackerlund said my share of Spun's profits is out here somewhere...

There are greater signs of strain, though. Probably unavoidable for an ambitious movie, shot in 21 days on a budget of about $1.5 million. Apparently the backstory was plenty violent for the producers, but not quite obvious enough. So be prepared for some obvious overdubbing, where dialogue is interjected to 'explain' the plot. No one needs an omnipotent narrator with no sense of decorum butting into things. Besides turning the discovery of a strange book into the second (fourth?) coming of the Necronomicon, these dumb intrusions simply make the supernatural elements too obvious. Worse, they're kinda funny.

And that's really unforgivable, because the rest of the film is moody and determined enough to get away with a loose plot and backstory. By adding concrete explanations, Dead Birds is cheapened. It's not enough that a short schedule simply didn't offer time to flesh things out more fully; they've got to pull in the Ghost of Stephen King's Career to make it painfully obvious.

Having dispatched the opposition, Justice Roy Moore knew his monument had found a new home.

Those time and money shortages don't have to be deal breakers -- and they're not. How many horror films have moments where the seams show, and we just willingly move on, because life's too short? What I like about Dead Birds is that it's a great snapshot of how much can be done with relatively little, and a reminder that even with one compromise after another, plenty of people will leave the theatre scared and happy.

Check this one out. It pulls off the period setting and drips with uneasy atmosphere. Even the trite explanations can't ruin the mood, and I'd pick a flawed but honest horror flick over a glossy TRL ghost story without even blinking.

6.8 out of 10

The Look

Considering how little money was spent on this movie, and how dark many scenes are, this is a fine looking disc. There's an extra helping of grain and noise in the first scene's blue sky, but for the most part the transfer is clear and fairly crisp. There is some edge enhancement, but since two thirds of the film is dimly lit, with a palette that avoids high-contrast areas, it's not overpowering.

7 out of 10

The Noise

Most of the film is accompanied by a rumbling, occasionally brassy score, and there's a lot of depth in the Dolby track. There's actually a bit too much music in the film, but here at least it all sounds great. Quieter dialogue passages can get buried a bit, forcing a volume bump, but I didn't have to watch with one hand on the remote.

You got a credit card?

The biggest problem with the soundtrack is the excessive use of ADR. It's really noticeable in a few key scenes because the dialogue synch is way off. I didn't catch this the first time (it was midnight, and the sixth film I'd seen that day) but on DVD the effect was extremely distracting.

5 out of 10

The Goodies

Deleted scenes - Most of this footage was sacrificed to serve that almighty god, running time. Alex Turner is candid, however, about the bits that were cut for being below par. One scene reinforces the common wisdom that, on the frustration scale, filming children and animals rates below only lapdances and phoning the natural gas company.

The Making of Dead Birds - Any featurette that kicks off with a very drunk producer saying 'either we get this done in a month or we're fucked' is OK by me. No glossy EPK, this. The content is pretty tyical -- pre-production, shooting and some talk about post-production -- but the video footage captures some of the manic energy of making a period move in a very limited time frame.

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Commentaries - On track one, we get director Alex Turner flying solo; on the second track he's joined by Henry Thomas, Nikki Aycox, Peter Lopez (composer) and Simon Barrett (writer). The solo commentary is a little bit dry, but as things go on, Turner's tone turns wry as he talks about the process of working without the luxury of time and budget, pointing out all the things that I thought didn't work as the film went along. And he explains the worst line in the film -- when Isiah Washington identifies a book in the barn -- as a last-minute piece of ADR which really should have reverted back to the original dialogue. The group track is more lively, though there's a good amount of repetition from the solo track.

7 out of 10

The Artwork

Ugh. Is this from that mooted Gothika sequel set in Silent Hill? Maybe a capture from the death throes of Photoshop taken during the uninstallation process? The disc's menus at least preserve the beautiful macro-focus shots used for the title sequence. The movie might be a tough sell, but it doesn't deserve this cover.

0 out of 10