“Bird Box” (**1/2 out of four) was a sporadically effective and creepy horror thriller set in a dystopian future in which a worldwide virus has erupted causing a feisty mother (Sandra Bullock) and her two children to go through civilization blindfolded and they stumble upon a household with other survivors (John Malkovich, Trevante Rhodes, and others). Film cuts back and forth from them being in the house to them being on their own in civilization. Bullock and Malkovich’ usual strong performances and intermittent scares and clever moments are dissipated by film’s overlength. Its cutting back-and-forth narrative structure also becomes annoying after a while. Same story was told more-or-less in M. Night Shymalahan’s “The Happening” in 2008.