It’s funny to think back to December 2018, that pre-pandemic world, when everyone decided that they wanted to spend their holiday breaks watching a terrified, blindfolded Sandra Bullock try to escape a mysterious force that compels people to suicide. Before “Tiger King,” before “Squid Game,” “Bird Box” was a phenomenon for Netflix. Sure, they self-report their numbers and keep metrics like viewing hours, households and watches intentionally vague, but they also don’t tout all their movie-star driven pictures like that: “Bird Box” was an unambiguous hit.
Was it because the movie was good? Watercooler worthy? A universal love for Bullock? Maybe it was just something new that everyone in the house could agree on. It’s fascinating and frustrating to see movies, good and bad, that came and went in their time in the past 30 years hitting a nerve with the culture at once because they happen to be on Netflix. “Bird Box” may not have been a great film, but it was exciting and intriguing enough at the exact right moment, with a good cast and all the dressings of a Hollywood movie from its director (Suzanne Bier) to its score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross. And it had a sheen of “edginess,” that can-you-believe-it factor that would benefit “Squid Game” later.
