‘She likes dead people and poetry’
Broken Bird is a 2024 horror film about Sybil who works as an undertaker. It’s a lonely job, with few perks. So she takes solace where she can.
Directed by Joanne Mitchell from a screenplay co-written with Dominic Brunt based on the 2018 short Sybil which was co-written by Tracey Sheals.
The Catalyst Studios-Mitchell-Brunt Films co-production stars Rebecca Calder, James Fleet, Jelena Moore, Jay Taylor, Steven William Moore, Sacharissa Claxton, Jessica Yemi, Rupert Procter, Paul Kampf, Kerry Doyle and Robyn Rainsford.
Plot:
Sybil Chamberlain works as a professional mortician at a funeral parlour. She has spent her life looking for love. Brought up as a privileged, carefree child, at the age of ten, she lost everything in a tragic accident. A darkness fell over her as the bright lights of her life were snuffed out swiftly and cruelly.
Now, an emptiness, an aching loneliness prevails, a gloomy void she seeks to fill. Reality and reason are slipping away from Sybil, and her dark desires are becoming more insatiable and progressively out of control. Will she ever find happiness and contentment, especially as the company she keeps is mainly deceased?
Reviews:
“For the most part, it works. Sybil is an intriguing character with an engaging arc. What starts off as silly and quirky gets increasingly dark as Broken Bird progresses. She goes from being darkly comedic to straight up frightening. The tight writing makes sure this transition is smooth and never feels out of place no matter how wild it gets.” AIPT
“[Rebecca Calder] confidently straddles garrulous (to the corpses) and terse (to the clients), quirky and creepy, resolute and shambolic, and somehow finds a strange serenity at the heart of spiralling gothic madness that keeps the character on-side. With an unerring but sardonic sense of how death presses in on us all, this is a promisingly pungent debut from Mitchell.” ★★★★ The Guardian
“For a feature debut, Broken Bird is about as solid as they come. Mitchell has clearly spent the last few years finessing her craft before making the move from short to feature, and that hard work and dedication has paid off. Part psychological chiller, part Gothic romance, and featuring a healthy dose of grim occurrences, Broken Bird is delightfully dark…” The Hollywood News
“Broken Bird is one of the most impressive horror films of the year, with a remarkable central performance from Rebecca Calder and excellent supporting work from Claxton and Fleet. I’m still thinking about it and I’m sure it won’t leave my thoughts for some time. It’s funny, it’s shocking, it’s tear jerking. It’s brilliant.” ★★★★★ Love Horror
“It draws you in with Calder’s remarkable, almost coquette take on her character but when it takes it’s eventual turn, the tension is definitely ramped up. It’s not without its flaws though, with seemingly three different narratives taking place at the same time. But at its crescendo, as we learn more and more about Sybil’s past life, and the unhinged yet beautifully shot finale is worth the film’s initial slow pacing.” The Yorkshire Post
YouTube reviews:
Trailer:
Release:
Strike Media released Broken Bird in UK cinemas on August 30, 2024.
Country of origin:
United Kingdom
Working title:
Sybil
Technical specs:
1 hour 39 minutes
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