Bird Box Barcelona Review

Netflix’s adaptation of author Josh Malerman’s post-apocalyptic novel Bird Box was a sensational hit for the platform in 2018 – which makes a sequel seem ridiculously overdue. Filmmakers David and Àlex Pastor take the series overseas in Bird Box Barcelona, less a direct sequel and more a simultaneous-yet-unconnected anthology chapter. No Sandra Bullock, no American backdrops, and almost no connection to Malerman’s follow-up novel Malorie. The Pastor brothers approach Bird Box like how Max Brooks’ zombie novel World War Z tells individual tales of undead mayhem across the globe. It’s a more supernatural examination of the nondescript entities eradicating Earth’s population, digging deeper into cultist factions and religious parallels that refuse to recycle the original film’s more straightforward survival tale. A continuation with standalone appeal, Bird Box Barcelona earns praise for distancing itself from the first film, but ultimately suffers as flimsier screenplay “logic” plagues a story too desperately focused on being different.

The film centers on former engineer Sebastián (Mario Casas), a survivor navigating the streets of Barcelona while trying to avoid eye contact with the ambiguous invaders introduced in Bird Box. Sebastián’s purpose is much like Martin Freeman’s infected Andy in Cargo or John Krasinski’s Lee Abbott in A Quiet Place – protect his daughter Anna (Alejandra Howard) at all costs. Bird Box Barcelona feels step-in-step with A Quiet Place II, featuring footage of the Spanish city’s plunge into chaos as we relive the initial attack anew or witness strong familial ties tested by unspeakable dangers (plus the continued common obstacles of limiting the characters’ sensory perception). It’s a race that A Quiet Place II handily wins, since Bird Box Barcelona trades nastier lockdown intensity for existential dread and fantastical, grim storytelling, an intriguing tradeoff that leaves shadowy and chilly frights behind.

With Barbarian standout Georgina Campbell playing fellow survivor and English psychiatrist Claire and Babylon’s Diego Calva as brainy scientist Octavio, Bird Box Barcelona boasts a stellar ensemble. The Pastors indulge in societal breakdowns after floating Lovecraftian deathmongers become commonplace, putting more stress on character interactions. Secrets stoke unease as survivors question a priest’s devotion in the name of miracles or an outsider’s claims to know where life-saving generators exist, and performances sustain interpersonal tension between shifty eyes or disbelieving hesitations. At its best, Bird Box Barcelona exploits humanity’s desire to trust thy neighbor by showing a billion ways untested faith can go abysmally wrong.

Sebastián quickly asserts himself as a curious, then deeply complex leading character for reasons that won’t be divulged in this review. But in the long run, those traits hurt Bird Box Barcelona, which shapeshifts between a slasher as told from the inside (minus the cutthroat scares or whodunit mystery), and a father-daughter drama that seems to serve a contrasting science-fiction tone. The Pastors take a gamble on the script’s structure by subverting how horror movies typically attempt to keep audiences guessing, which is refreshing at first but tedious within a two-hour runtime. Cuts between current events and exposition flashbacks become redundant at a point because we already know the outcome – we quickly suss out where these flashbacks will conclude. Intended shock and awe withers, squeezing in these interludes from months past like padding that subtracts from the overall experience.

This is a psychological thriller that doesn’t thrill, but its themes are sound. ​​The religious tendency to hurriedly declare unknowns as glorious signs from above without assessing danger or reality is questioned: Leonardo Sbaraglia plays a clergyman seemingly serving Earth’s new merciless overlords. Tragedies in Sebastián’s past become easily manipulated as we learn more about the character, displaying the volatility of human emotions and how easily they (and we) can be controlled. This is as good as Bird Box Barcelona gets – there’s just so much more movie wrapped around these morally contemplative moments. The Pastors try to keep momentum building with an explosion blast here and a metal-mashing bus crash there, but their execution is stop-and-go.

It’s also a problem that they’ve made a movie with such an indistinct look and feel. The Pastors themselves generated better end-times doom and gloom in 2009’s viral outbreak indie Carriers — a movie with less budget but infinitely more impact and presence. Bird Box Barcelona may stand on its own ideas regarding Sebastián’s journey, but everything else resembles a run-of-the-mill, post-Walking Dead dystopia. Maybe that’s due to a story stretched thin to fit Netflix’s data-driven longer running times. When you can feel a film dragging, all production elements suffer.

Author: Erik Adams. [Source Link (*), IGN All]

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