Director Dan Gitsham and Writer Sophie Mair’s horror short is a masterful creepy tale about dysfunction and what happens when your actions have dire consequences. I wasn’t sure what to expect with “The Thing that Ate the Birds,” but partners Mair and Gitsham deliver on all fronts as a complex and creepy genre entry.
The film is set on the North Yorkshire Moors and tells the story of Abel and Grace, a couple on the brink of divorce in the face of real life complications. Furthering the frustration is that something seems to be eating the birds around Abel, a gamekeeper’s farm. One day he and his assistant Jake find out what is eating the birds and things spiral out of control quickly when he returns to his farm.
“The Thing That Are the Birds” watches like a spooky campfire tale, something that it told in circles teaching about karma and the price of actions. Co-financed by BFI Network and ALTER the film premiered internationally at SXSW 2021, was selected for over 60 film festivals including Sundance London, Beyond Fest, Tampere Film Festival and San Sebastian. Along the way the film picked up a few awards including Best Short Film Screenplay at Knoxville Horror Fest, Horrible Imaginings and Cornwall Film Fest and Best Horror Short at Indy Shorts and Vortex Horror Festival alongside special mentions at Motel X and Celluloid Screams.
The power behind “The Thing…” is the ace production by Gitsham who builds upon suspense and excellent ambiguity. We’re not entirely sure what is happening around Abel’s farm, but we know it surely isn’t normal. The unveiling of what is unfolding is subtle but absolutely terrifying, especially when we comprehend the levity of what Abel has unleashed. A lot of Gitsham’s film is a morality tale about what happens when we don’t properly calculate the potential consequences. Eoin Slattery and Rebecca Palmer are fantastic playing off one another as a couple teetering on the brink of divorce.
We can never really be sure what the thing that ate the birds are, we just know that Abel would have been better off probably building some kind of compromise with, something that reflects his uneasy marriage. James Swanton in his small role, paired with the top notch special effects, is absolutely mind blowing, and I definitely shuddered at the final scene. Gitsham and Mair leave us on a final note that will keep audiences stirring in their boots. I really hope we can see more from Gitsham and Mair very soon, as “The Thing That Ate the Birds” is a surefire dose of classic horror. I wanted more.