Rafly G. Culture 10.30.2020 21:Oct PM EDT

Songbird: Michael Bay's Newest Dystopian Horror Tiptoes On Our Worst Fear About COVID-19

Michael Bay, known for his work in A Quiet Place, goes the extra in Songbird. The dystopian horror movie is set in 2024, the year in which COVID-19 has aggressively mutated into COVID-23.

Songbird portrays a love story during the 214th week of the lockdown. Shot entirely in Los Angeles during the pandemic, Songbird daringly touches on the taboo subject of what the whole world is experiencing at the moment.

Check out the full trailer here.

Songbird: Story and Characters

Nico is an immune bike messenger. The only thing he has in mind is to reunite with his lover, Sara, in a world where cities are in their fourth year of lockdown and made into several Q-Zones. He must race against the time and the law to save her where the virus's mortality rate reaches over 50 percent.

"It's a dystopian, scary world, but it's a romantic movie about two people who want to be together, but they can't," filmmaker Adam Mason told Entertainment Weekly. "It's Romeo and Juliet, but they're separated by her front door and by the virus."

Starring' beardy' KJ Apa (Riverdale) as Nico and Sofia Carson (Descendants), Songbird is entirely produced amidst the lockdown. The two share the stage with Alexandra Daddario, Bradley Whitford, Demi Moore, Paul Walter Hauser, Craig Robinson, and Peter Stormare.

Songbird is yet to announce its release date. With the current situation, maybe it's safe to not expect a theatrical release shortly. Even if it is, it's highly likely that STX & Platinum Dunes are to team up with premium retailers to distribute the movie at home.

Mixed Reaction

Songbird is a dark movie for a dark time. Upon its trailer release, Songbird has met with quite mixed reactions. As the whole world is currently grieving and coping with the virus, a movie that overexaggerates and tiptoes on our worst fear is definitely tone-deaf.

Adrian Horton of The Guardian calls the movie an attempt to squeeze the pandemic's collective trauma for big bucks and entertainment. Halle Kiefer from Vulture sarcastically criticizes the film as a way of turning our 'collective despair' into big chunks of profit.

This is not the first and definitely will not be Hollywood's last venture in COVID-themed works. Love in the Time of Corona miniseries from Freeform and Social Distance from Netflix all took the current tragedy as the premise.

Regardless of the intent, a movie about such a catastrophic event that everyone is experiencing at the moment is so tasteless.