Film Review: Bird Box

Whatever you do, don't open your eyes.

Academy Award-winning Danish director Susanne Bier’s Bird Box is a post-apocalyptic thriller that blends science fiction, horror, fantasy and the supernatural. Its greatest strength lies in what it withholds. There are no scary monsters stalking the landscape; instead, terror comes from unseen forces, eerie whispers and disturbing hallucinations.

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Based on Josh Malerman’s 2014 novel, Bird Box: Don't Open Your Eyes, the film opens with Malorie Hayes (Sandra Bullock) and two young children making a desperate journey to safety. Blindfolded, they must navigate forests and a treacherous river while avoiding mysterious entities that drive anyone who sees them to madness and suicide.

Through a series of flashbacks, we learn how the catastrophe began. Pregnant and alone after the death of her sister, Malorie finds refuge with a small group of survivors, including the cynical Douglas (John Malkovich), the dependable Tom (Trevante Rhodes) and Olympia (Danielle Macdonald), who is also expecting a child. Five years later, with the world still in the grip of the unseen menace, Malorie, Tom and the children struggle to survive until a violent attack forces her and the youngsters onto the river.

Bier skillfully shifts between past and present, gradually revealing the story while sustaining tension. The flashbacks occasionally feel overused, but they never diminish the film’s suspense. What makes Bird Box so effective is its atmosphere. The unseen threat is far more unsettling than any conventional movie monster, while the survivors’ conflicting personalities add another layer of unpredictability. The mystery of what exactly lurks outside remains unresolved, but that uncertainty is part of the film’s appeal.

Stephen King described Bird Box as “riveting”, and I agree. Bier packs the film with relentless tension. She also explores how ordinary people respond when confronted with an unimaginable threat and the possibility of sudden death.

From start to finish, this is Sandra Bullock’s film. She anchors the story with a convincing performance that captures fear, determination and vulnerability in equal measure. The supporting cast, particularly Rhodes and Malkovich, complements her well.

My only reservations were Malkovich’s somewhat one-note character and the credibility of Malorie and the children surviving a blindfolded journey through such hostile terrain. Neither, however, prevented me from thoroughly enjoying the film on Christmas Day.

Short Story: Partners — Rogue Lawyer by John Grisham

Partners: Rogue Lawyer (2016) is a 60-page prequel to John Grisham’s full novel Rogue Lawyer published a year before. It is also Grisham's first digital short story, written in his familiar style: concise prose and a brisk pace, which keeps the reader turning pages until the end.

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Since I hadn’t read Rogue Lawyer, it seemed sensible to begin with Partners: Rogue Lawyer and find out how Sebastian Rudd first meets Thomas Cardell, better known as Tee Ray. By the end of the story, Tee Ray has offered to become Rudd’s partner, bodyguard, law clerk and driver all rolled into one.

In effect, John Grisham introduced readers to Rudd and Cardell in Rogue Lawyer and then returned to tell the story of how the two first crossed paths.

Rudd, in his early thirties, is a street lawyer who works out of a converted bar in a crime-ridden neighbourhood. He represents clients other lawyers avoid—people he often suspects are guilty long before they enter a courtroom. Yet, his courtroom skills have earned him a formidable reputation. Despite having handled more jury trials than most lawyers his age, he remains one of the most unpopular attorneys in town.

Rudd’s unpopularity reaches new heights when he reluctantly agrees to defend Tee Ray, a Black drug courier charged with killing a White police officer in what he claims was self-defence. The slain officer—a decorated Marine and former honour student—quickly becomes a local hero, with the town, the media and the police force rallying behind him. Rudd, meanwhile, finds himself caught between his client’s powerful employers in the drug trade and threats to his own life.

Rudd knows that without hard evidence or credible witnesses, Tee Ray is likely to be sentenced to death for killing the police officer. Determined to uncover the truth, he begins digging and, with help from contacts in the drug organisation, discovers that Tee Ray’s account is accurate. He had been forced to shoot only after the officer opened fire on him repeatedly. Looking to boost his arrest record, the cop had targeted Tee Ray, who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. A swift trial follows.

Partners is a fast-paced and well-crafted story that examines not only a violent crime but also the racial tensions that continue to shape American society. Grisham handles these themes with his customary restraint and sensitivity. One of the book’s strengths is that its characters are neither saints nor villains. Regardless of which side of the law they occupy, they are portrayed as flawed individuals.

Another enduring quality of Grisham’s fiction is his sympathy for the underdog. Through characters such as Tee Ray, whose chief ambition is to provide a better life for his teenage son, he gives a voice to people who are often overlooked. It is this empathy, as much as the legal drama, that gives the story its emotional weight.

Timequake by Kurt Vonnegut and other books

I bought no more than a dozen secondhand books this year. I’m pretty sure of that. Let me see—a few westerns, thrillers and spy fiction, some Lee Child, P.G. Wodehouse, Agatha Christie, Erle Stanley Gardner, Enid Blyton and Kurt Vonnegut. Yes, that’s about it. I haven’t read any of the books yet.

© Prashant C. Trikannad

I also ordered some nonfiction from Amazon. They're all there in the picture on the left. I haven't read those either. Although I have been dipping into the books on writing, I don't read them from cover to cover.

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Separately, I also picked up Khushwant Singh’s autobiography Truth, Love & A Little Malice (2002). Singh was a diplomat, journalist, columnist, parliamentarian and author. He was also one of India's most entertaining storytellers. I enjoyed his clear, straightforward style. The book itself had a troubled publication history and was delayed for several years because of a court case.

I also added a handful of comic-books to my collection as well. These included two graphic adaptations from the Warrior Cats series by Erin Hunter, the shared pen name of several children's writers. I also downloaded a few titles offered during Amazon's Free Comic Book Day promotion. Most of my comics reading happens during the daily commute.

Of the fiction books, I plan to start with Kurt Vonnegut's Timequake. It's presented as a novel, though from what I've gathered it's part-fiction, part-autobiography and part-reflection on writing and life. Vonnegut himself described it as a "stew" and his last novel.

The central idea is an intriguing one. A glitch in time forces everyone to relive ten years of their lives exactly as before, unable to change a single decision or action. Vonnegut uses that premise as a starting point, but the book seems to wander freely into memories, observations and stories about family, aging and the business of being a writer.

We'll see how it goes. 

Kurt Vonnegut is one of my favourite writers. I like his writing so much that I'm often tempted to imitate his style. His sentences were short, simple and almost staccato. He had a knack for saying a lot with very little. Add to that a wry sense of humour, and it's easy to see why I keep returning to his books.

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's a comics fan!

When Marvel legend Stan Lee died on November 12, 2018, millions of fans mourned him. Television host Bill Maher seemed puzzled by the outpouring of grief. In a blog post, he wondered why the passing of creator of Spider-Man, the Hulk and so many iconic superheroes should result in such grief, suggesting Lee had merely encouraged people to read comics and watch superhero movies.

As a comic-book fan who has been reading and collecting comics for more than four decades, I didn't mind Maher's remarks. I just thought he had missed the point. To people who don't read comics, they're often seen as children's entertainment or a form of escapism. To diehard readers like me, they're more personal. They entertain us, certainly, but they also stay with us, shape our imagination and, sometimes, even influence the way we look at things.

That probably explains why Maher's comments drew such a strong reaction from comic-book fans. Actor Chris Evans is believed to have said, "The comic book world is so dangerous... they're very opinionated fans. But they're great fans." He wasn't wrong. 

For many readers, comics aren't simply stories on paper. They're tied to memories.

Mine certainly are.

I was about eight years old when an uncle in San Diego sent my dad a carton containing around 40 Marvel and DC comics. Those crisp Silver Age and Bronze Age issues had travelled thousands of miles to reach our home in Goa, and they started a love of comics that has stayed with me ever since. Dad then began collecting comics, and I happily became his young accomplice.

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My comic-book universe wasn't limited to Marvel or DC superheroes. It included the Justice League, The Fantastic Four and the Avengers, and also The Pandavas Princes, the Maurya kings and other Great Indian Emperors, and so many wonderful comics published by Amar Chitra Katha (Immortal Picture Stories)—India’s largest-selling comic-book imprint. There was room, too, for Tarzan, the Phantom and Mandrake the Magician among hundreds of others. To me, they all belonged on the same bookshelf.

One story has stayed with me more than most.

One evening, my dad picked up Gopal and the Cowherd, a popular Bengali folktale from Amar Chitra Katha and read it out to me.

Gopal, a young boy, is frightened of walking alone through a forest to school. His mother tells him to call out to his brother, who will protect him. The boy does exactly that, and a mysterious cowherd appears, wearing a peacock-feather crown and playing a flute. He escorts Gopal safely to school and back each day. Only later does the boy's mother, his teachers and classmates realise that the cowherd was Lord Krishna himself.

As a kid, I found the story deeply moving. Looking back, I realise the story was about courage, faith and kindness without ever sounding like a lesson. 

That, to me, is one of the strengths of comic-books. The best ones entertain first and teach quietly.

Over the years I kept returning to comics—not only for excitement but also for comfort. Heroes like Arjuna and Captain America reminded me that courage isn't the absence of fear but the willingness to do the right thing despite it. At different times in life, comics became a welcome escape, a source of optimism, and a reminder that difficult situations don't last forever.

Today's comics exist alongside blockbuster films, television series and digital editions, but their appeal hasn't changed. To me, they still speak through speech bubbles and pictures in a way few other forms of storytelling can.

One of my favourite comic-book film moments comes from Spider-Man 2, when Aunt May says:

"There's a hero in all of us, that keeps us honest, gives us strength, makes us noble..."

That line isn't just about superheroes. It's about ordinary people trying to do their best every day.

Maybe that's why I still read comics long after I've grown up.

Or have I?

The Sheriff of Kalbadevi

I have been a big fan of Western Fiction or Frontier Fiction from the time a paternal uncle introduced me to English writer Oliver Strange's Sudden series. I was in my teens and I was hooked. His ten novels and an additional five by Frederick H. Christian (British writer and editor Frederick Nolan) have been featured on this blog a few times. The exploits of James Green, alias Sudden, the Texas outlaw, led to my heightened interest in other western authors, notably Louis L'Amour, J.T. Edson, Zane Grey, Max Brand, George G. Gilman, Wayne D. Overholser, Jonas Ward, Giles A. Lutz and others. I continue to read westerns.

Since then, however, I have always dreamed of writing a western novel. There were even a few halfhearted attempts. In August 2015, I began work on a Wild West-comes-to-India novel in earnest. At least, that was the plan. I typed out a few thousand words and was pleased with the way the story was shaping up. It was about a Western-styled Indian sheriff set in an old part of Mumbai in the 21st century. So it had cowboys and gunfights as well as four-wheeler taxis and pizza delivery.

But Procrastination and Distraction, the two nemesis of my writing life, bushwhacked me along the way and that was the end of what I thought would one day be my debut novel called The Sheriff of Kalbadevi.

Then, last month, I read about a short story contest at Juggernaut Books, a popular Indian writing platform where I had previously published an atmospheric tale set around a murder mystery, titled A Little Murder at Dinner. I retrieved my western story from the recesses of D drive on my computer, scaled it down to a little over 2,000 words, got the family to proofread the story, and uploaded it on the Juggernaut website. As of writing this post, the results were yet to be announced.

The story begins in Kalbadevi, an old neighbourhood of Mumbai named after the Hindu goddess Kalbadevi. The area has an old-world charm and is known for its wholesale markets, usually bustling with activity six days a week. I worked along its periphery for many years.

This is how The Sheriff of Kalbadevi begins.

Friday night descended on Kalbadevi like any other summer night, the weather still unforgiving. Long after the Indian sun ducked into the Arabian Sea, the old neighbourhood of Mumbai was enveloped in a haze of April heat and dust. Red earth rose and swirled in the air, settled down, and rose again.  

Kalinga sat hunched on his horse under a yellow streetlight. He blew smoke from a cigarette and looked around him with a sense of boredom. There was little movement on the intersection of Princess Street and JSS Road. Two young cowboys on horseback were riding out, back to their ranch or maybe to the seafront on the other side of town, to meet their girlfriends. A woman hurried across the street with her young son and disappeared round the corner of a dilapidated building. Shopkeepers and roadside hawkers were closing business for the day. A group of weary traders vanished behind a tobacco-stained curtain into a country liquor bar. When they staggered out, they would be men no more. He eyed them with distaste.

And here is a significant passage appearing towards the end.

The four gunmen stared in disbelief as two six-guns appeared magically in the sheriff's hands and spit fire simultaneously. They didn't stand a chance. His first bullet caught Balki plumb between the eyes. He died instantly and slid to the ground head first. His horse bolted. Two of his sidekicks got a bullet each in the chest and were thrown off their horses. His fourth bullet sliced through the throat of the last man who slumped in his saddle. It was all over in less than a minute.

Instantly, a new legend was born and it'd travel miles and miles, just like all of his fabled gunfights of the past.

If you're tempted to read the full story, then please click here. I hope you like it. I had fun writing it, partly because it was an original idea.

And if you're still around, you may also like to read A Little Murder at Dinner and the related Editor's Pick of the Week interview Juggernaut Books did with me in June this year.

Book Review: Rain on the Dead by Jack Higgins

I will give you my verdict right away. Rain on the Dead (2014) is one of the most disappointing Jack Higgins novels I have read.

The British writer's 76th action thriller features a familiar cast of anti-terrorism veterans: the legendary former IRA gunman Sean Dillon (in his 21st appearance); his boss, General Charles Ferguson, who heads a secret intelligence unit reporting to 10 Downing Street; Captain Sara Gideon, a decorated Afghan war veteran; Major Giles Roper, a wheelchair-bound technology wizard; and Billy Salter, a gangster-turned-MI5 agent, along with his gun-handy uncle Harry, who runs a dockside pub.

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While those are good reasons to read the book, a weak story and an even weaker plot are compelling reasons to give it a miss. Unless, like me, you're a die-hard Jack Higgins fan who will read anything by the man who gave us such gripping novels as The Last Place God Made (1971), A Prayer for the Dying (1973) and The Eagle Has landed (1975).

Rain on the Dead begins with a failed assassination attempt on the charismatic former US President Jake Cazalet at his estate on Nantucket, an island off Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Unfortunately for the two Al Qaeda-backed Chechen gunmen, Ferguson and his team happen to be visiting Cazalet at the time and foil the plot masterminded by a faceless figure known only as the Master. Not very original and not very scary either.

From there, the action shifts to Drumgoole in Ireland, Paris and finally London, as Ferguson's team thwarts repeated attempts to kill Cazalet. Frustrated by these failures, the Master, who reports to some kind of grand council, hires more desperate men, including rogue special ops soldiers, to eliminate Dillon, Gideon and the others. They fail too.

Two more things kept me from enjoying the novel.

The writing, peppered with dialogue, often felt amateurish. Preposterous as it may sound, I even wondered whether the book had been ghostwritten. The narrative lacked depth, the conversations were at times school-grade, and there were even a few typos. This was not the Jack Higgins I grew up reading.

Then there is Sean Dillon himself. His role during the Troubles in Northern Ireland continues to haunt him, as it does many of Higgins' former IRA protagonists. Though still respected by his allies and feared by his enemies, Dillon is clearly past his prime. Maybe it was intentional. Here, he plays a largely supporting role, rarely doing more than turning up with his Colt .25. Instead, the brave Captain Sara Gideon and the young, reckless Billy Salter take centre stage as they hunt down the shadowy Master before he can get anywhere near Jake Cazalet, who first appeared in The President's Daughter (1997).  

So, will I stop reading Jack Higgins? Never. I still have many of his novels waiting on my shelves, and I'm certain most of them will remind me why he remains one of my favourite thriller writers.

Book Review: Merrick by Ben Boulden

"Thief, gunman, killer. A hero you'll hate, but root for anyway."
 
Every time I watch a heist movie or read a story about an armed robbery, the same thought crosses my mind: Something's going to go wrong. No matter how meticulous the planning, things don’t always go as intended.

That's exactly what Merrick—a tough outlaw with a conscience and the hero of this fast-paced Western short story by by Ben Boulden—discovers when he joins forces with an old partner to ambush an armoured wagon in Texas and make off with a $15,000 payroll.

Merrick, who is brought in as a last-minute replacement, is well aware of the risks involved in the venture. Experience has taught him that a holdup is never easy, even if the dough is. Though reluctant to accept mastermind Clarence Tilley’s offer at first, the .44 Remington wielding outlaw cannot resist the lure of $15,000 and the prospect of moving to the California coast to live the good life.

But Merrick's getaway plan is shattered when Spider Robison, a particularly vile, greedy and trigger-happy gang member, double-crosses his accomplices, clubs Merrick over the head and makes off with the loot. After regaining consciousness, Merrick sets out to hunt Robison, not so much to seek revenge as to retrieve his rightful share of the haul and be on his way.

Merrick is not the quintessential Wild West outlaw. He is an outlaw alright but one with a conscience—a man willing to break the law, yet unwilling to cross certain lines. Tough, dangerous and quick on the draw when he has to be, Merrick also possesses a vulnerability, a sense of fair play and justice, and perhaps even compassion, qualities that set him apart from others of his kind.

At just 25 pages, Merrick is a cracker of a Western that fans of the genre will relish. Its simple but engaging plot—a stage robbery gone wrong—reminded me of the pocket-sized black-and-white Western comics I read in my youth. I could almost see each scene unfolding as a comic-book panel. Merrick would make an excellent comic-book.

I hope Ben Boulden—author of Blaze! Red Rock Rampage (15) and Blaze! Spanish Gold (18) in the Blaze! Adult Western Series—casts Merrick in more short stories, perhaps even a novel or two. I’d like to read more about the Utah outlaw’s exploits in the author's crisp narrative style.