Kaw

I couldn't keep a straight face while watching this. All I could think of was The Crows Have Eyes III from Schitt's Creek and Moira's daft performance. Just another The Bird's ripoff, don't bother.

It doesn't take a genus to know that a huge inspirational factor behind this guilty pleasure was Hitchcock's The Birds. I thought this movie would be a terrible B-movie that should never be enjoyed by the general public, for the most part it is true, but because of that I enjoyed this film. The birds were so badly CGed and the acting was okay, the scares were not there and the gore wasn't enough. There were points in the movie where I could not watch it because it lost and bored me, so I had to resort to other things to keep my mind interested. The attack scenes were kind of humorous and laughable.

However, despite these negative factors that drug this movie down, these very same factors made me like the movie a lot. I'm not ashamed to watch it again, and I probably will, but it's like Snakes on the Plane or Chopping Mall, it's so bad it's good and I can't deny that. I watched it and knew fully that I would not be able to take it seriously, which is why when the movie ended I sat back and said "That was a very long, boring and entertaining roller coaster ride." I would recommend this movie to those who love cult classics or really bad B-movies; even those who enjoy indie films or low-budgeters would enjoy this. Though, if your palate includes something a bit more scary or disturbing, you might want to stay away from it. Relationship wise, it's all bittersweet for me.

A silly and plodding effort, Kaw (Lame, lame title) is watchable but missable. The attack by animals thing has been many times before and Kaw brings nothing new to the table.

There is a lot of stupidity in Kaw. The explanation for the ravens going crazy is ludicrous- mad cow disease!? How the hell these ravens in Middle America got affected by mad cow disease is never really addressed and nor is the fact that this degenerative brain disease seems to make them way more intelligent and develop a sophisticated societal mentality. There is no scene sillier in the movie than the part in which the ravens attack the besieged school bus by picking up rocks and throwing them at the windows. Surely somebody at some point in the process of making this movie must have been aware how goofy this looked. The subplot about the Amish (Or Mennonites or whatever they were) is lame and brings nothing to the plot. It is hard to make the freakin' Amish look menacing, especially not half-arsed car driving, button wearing Amish like these and Kaw does not meet the challenge. Plus the men are wearing the fakest looking false beards you'll ever see.

The characters are standard horror movie archetypes. How many movies must we see set in a small town where a couple are divided over whether or not to stay, one of them wanting to pursue a career in the outside world and the other preferring quaint, small town life, reluctantly dragged along? The only good character in the movie is Clyde, the gun toting, recovering alcoholic bus driver played by the reliable and ever creepy Stephen McHattie ("Don't get ravens like that in Philly. But I guess you wouldn't know anything about that, would you, Joey?") Everyone else is bland or annoying. Actually, there is only one really annoying character- the smarmy teen bitch, who sadly survives when most of those around her from the ill fated bus trip die. I'm sad to say Sean Patrick Flannery never grew up to be like Harrison Ford in terms of charisma or screen presence.

On the positive side the special effects are actually quite good, seeming to be a mixture of real birds, perhaps some practical visual effects and some good CGI. The fact you can't always tell how the shot was done is a sign it was well done. Even the more ludicrous scenes such as the one involving the ravens picking up rocks and throwing them at the bus actually looks fairly realistic no matter how dumb what we are seeing is.

Animal attack horror movies truly are a dime a dozen, and sometimes they can get extremely cheesy and crummy, often knowingly so, and sometimes they really aren't so bad. "Kaw" may overall be routine and unremarkable, but it handles its outlandish premise better than one would think, and refrains from doing a lot of winking at its audience. The special effects are never so awful that they just take you right out of the movie, either. Granted, the characters are clichés, and the movie isn't without silly moments, but it does deliver some decent thrills for undemanding B movie fans. Hell, it even works in a subplot about strained relationships between the "English" and the local Mennonites that fortunately doesn't detract too much from the basic storyline. The story, working as one big homage to the Hitchcock classic "The Birds", sees a ton of ravens literally tearing into the citizens of a small town; nobody can figure out why this is going on nor can they think of what to do about the situation. The actors in the lead roles are likable and reliable as always: Sean Patrick Flanery as local sheriff Wayne, who was actually about to leave his job, and Stephen McHattie as reformed drunk / school bus driver Clyde, who's one of the first to realize that the birds are going crazy. The supporting cast is capable if rather nondescript, but it is an absolute joy to see Wendy Lyon, the lead of "Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night II" as the dispatcher, and the presence of veteran actor Rod Taylor, who'd actually starred in "The Birds", as the local doctor, is extremely welcome. Filmed on location in Ontario, the movie has an appropriately gloomy look about it, and director Sheldon Wilson keeps it moving forward at an adequate pace. The most striking scene has the sheriff's wife (Kristin Booth) stuck in a well with an animal carcass. The ravens are portrayed by a combination of well trained avians and a generous dose of digital effects. There are some twists that are amusing to say the least, such as the ravens manipulating rocks in order to break glass. The ending falls short of really being satisfying, though, and the inclusion of a last-second jump scare is completely unnecessary and annoying. It's understandable how some viewers could find this tiresome, so just judge for yourself should you decide to watch. Five out of 10.

Alfred Hitchcock doesn't need to rollover in his grave just yet, but at some points during this average and largely uninspired imitation of "The Birds", we definitely came too damn close! Sheldon Wilson, who recently scored a modest hit with "Shallow Ground", adds very few elements to the original idea of aggressive birds (ravens, to be exact) attacking human beings, apart from an admittedly decent explanation for the their unusual behavior. On his very last day as the Sheriff of Middletown, Wayne encounters several peculiar fatal accidents that are seemingly inflicted by ordinary ravens, judging by the bloodied wounds on the victims' bodies. Long before Wayne and the local doctor (played by Rod Taylor; lead star of Hitchock's "The Birds"!) can find the time to investigate the reasons for the birds' murderous new instincts, they have to protect and evacuate the townspeople, as the bird-attacks rapidly become more frequent and hostile. As mentioned before, I appreciated the explanation given to the epidemic of virulent ravens. I won't reveal everything, but it relates to factual diseases cattle-breeders recently had to deal with, combined with the secluded and private life style of Amish communities. The rest of the film is overall decent too, but director Wilson sadly doesn't share Hitchcock's talents to make even a simple bird look scary and menacing. The multiple and extended images of hundreds of birds suspiciously observing the people of Middletown therefore aren't very unsettling and quickly tend to get boring. Their attacks naturally are a bit monotonous as well, since they can exclusively peck their victims to death and we all know this may take a while. And still, despite all these flaws and some more, "Kaw" is an overall entertaining creature-feature that mainly benefices from likable character drawings and neat acting performances. Although most of the characters are pure stereotypes (the Sheriff facing his ultimate challenge on his last day, the town's drunkard, etc...), you quickly develop sympathy for them and you hope that at least some of them make it out alive. The photography is quite nice, with a handful of ingenious POV shots and director Wilson also effectively creates a feeling of complete isolation. There probably isn't enough gore or cheese to satisfy the majority of fanatic horror fans. I count myself among them and I thought it easily could have been much gorier without affecting the plot in a bad way. Is it too much to ask to show at least one raven pecking out someone's eyeball and fly around it with it? Guess so... "Kaw" also stands for Sean Patrick Flannery's best career move since "Boondock Saints" – he starred in a lot of straight to video crap recently – and it was a fantastic stunt to motivate Rod Taylor to star in an unofficial homage to "The Birds". Taylor barely starred in any film since the early 90's, but he's still a powerful actor. I say this reasonably well-made and interesting film deserves at least one viewing.