Sadly Over-hyped

Great Film overall

A Brilliant Conflict

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

Dead Birds is Great, a modern horror masterpiece.SPOILERS AHEAD!!!You know when you saw the Shining for the first time and felt like there was never going to be a movie that amounted to the standard of Kubrick. Well, personally, i found it, and it is the 2004 horror film DEAD BIRDS. The film starts off with a bang (LITERALLY). The first 3 to 5 minutes of this horror/western is gory and violent as hell. Four or five people are massacred and gunned down by who we learn to be our main characters. After the massacre our group of ravenous outlaws head on the road. They then meat creatures of a lovecrafteian sort, skinned corpses, mutilated slaves, mangled and disfigured faces,and to top it off an ambiguous ending. On a film making stand point, for a low budget film its very well done. The production design alone is creepy and masturbatory. The film is set in the late 1800's in the western part of the states (Possibly MISSISSIPPI). The film fears dirty and grungy. The actors look dirty and grungy. Now, the actors in the film are very good. There are many actors who all give wonderful performances but like i said there is a lot of actors so i'm not going to tell them off. But note to self, there all very good!The creature effects alone are what holds this film on its claws, there great and creepy. Within the film there are these flesh, scrawny creatures and of course their scary looking. Their so freaky it might take a week to get there scary facial features out of your thought bank.overall, DEAD BIRDS is great modern psychological horror film. Its a deficient experience. Alex Turner, show first directorial film was DEAD BIRDS does a wonderful job at finding the moment in every creepy scene. The film is a wonderful, eerie, and frighting masterpiece. Also, i am a fan of Scream Factory and hopefully, claws crossed, that COLUMBIA pictures gets there proverbial head out of their tush and lets SF gain the rights to some of there greatest products like Fright Night, Brain Scan, 976-Evil, and of course DEAD BIRDS. Can you imagine a collectors edition of those and more (Oh my Lucifer that's great).

Set in Alabama at the end of the Civil War, we focus on a group of criminals who turn a bank into a bloodbath as they steal the gold and head for the border and Mexico. Their leader Will (Thomas) decides to stop at an abandoned plantation house for the evening. Making their way through a large cornfield in front of the house a white hairless creature with fangs jumps out of nowhere and delivers the first jump scare of the film before being gunned down. Once at the house, a few of the gang's members are thinking of grabbing the gold and deserting the gang but that is the least of Will's troubles. The house has a sense of dread and dark atmosphere hanging over it from what the former owner (Muse Watson) may have done to his family and his slaves. Voodoo may be at the end of it but the group begins having frightening visions, hearing voices and some of them start turning up missing. This independent feature from Writer Simon Barrett and Director Alex Turner is a high quality horror film. Making the most of an excellent two story house in the middle of nowhere, the house is practically a character in this movie. The rain storm raging outside makes this film's atmosphere top notch, and the creepy sounds and visions this film provides will put any viewer on edge. Don't forget the gore and some of the scariest original creature monsters you've seen in a while and Dead Birds is one creepy Horror film. Director Turner gets a lot of credit for not going overboard with the spooky elements and gore, he sticks to the story and all of it comes off very believable. The only frustrating part of this movie is its back story concerning the former owner and what happened on the property. It's obvious it has everything to do with what is happening to our gang of thieves and why the house is the way it is, but we never really find out why. They're a few flashbacks which show you some great stuff but the film never ties it all together in an understandable fashion. It's a shame but this head scratching over the storyline will be what stops this from becoming a classic. It's still a ton of fun and must view for any horror fan.

If you're into basic gore, this isn't your movie.If you like creepy, atmospheric, mindf--k movies, you'll like this one. It's a good indie-horror, and that's probably why it's so smart--there's no way a big studio would put any money into a horror film that requires thought on the part of the viewer.It's not without its faults, but it's pretty freaking awesome, and much better than most horror films around. It builds slowly, which usually works, but there are a few clunky moments. The acting isn't perfect, and there are parts where someone's timing seems to be a bit off, but that might have something to do with editing as well. Either way, the characters respond (super)naturally when it matters. Great movie. Again, don't watch it if you're just looking for zombie/slasher/gore/teenage horror. The only female character is clothed for pretty much the entire movie. Basically, watch this movie if you want to scare the bejeezus out of yourself in a way that will leave you feeling creeped out whenever you think about it for at least a few days.

I can't argue about this film for one reason. it only cost me One quid to buy. Now with one pound, you can end up buying films such as " the swamp thing" or the one with the giant tomatoes or any early Nicolas Cage film. However, Dead birds is not all that bad. Don't let the title put you off or the DVD case. Sure the title and cover art is cheap but the film itself is very polished.The film is based in the American civil war era and I rather enjoyed that as there not to many films that focus on that era. The opening is dramatic but after the first ten minutes, the film's pace slows right down. You end up having to watch a bunch of outlaws wondering around a deserted house for half an hour with very little dialogue and character development. This can put many people off but during this part, The director creates a brilliant, spooky atmosphere that is helped with great music . The camera work doesn't contribute to the atmosphere as it lacks any creativity . But visual, the film looks great.The huge drawback is that there wasn't to many scares. You watch these men ( and woman ) wonder around the house to only be let down by cheap jump out scares. the effects are mediocre at best. The acting is great all around but it all goes to waste. You watch them do nothing for the whole of the film until the last 15 minutes. The back story of house is told in about, 45 seconds which happens in a flashback.I can't help but feel that this film could of been so much better. The atmosphere was spot on and the acting was good but the film doesn't really do any justice. It weren't the worst film ever but either was it the best. Would i watch again? most likely not. For me it was a just a miss.