The Birds

Based upon the Daphne du Maurier novella, Hitchcock juxtaposes a playfully frantic love story and an apocalyptic fury of feathers and claws, which takes flight as a tense frisson of unbearable suspense and tragedy.

Melanie Daniels is a flighty socialite and Mitch Brenner a down-to-earth Public Defender: two disparate people who discover love at the end of the world. The film begins with Melanie, dressed in her green suite and expensive furs, crossing the street and looking skyward where a flock of birds ominously gather. An eerie hollow screech and sharp beating of wings dominate the soundtrack: Hitchcock doesn’t score the film and only briefly uses foreground music.

As Melanie pursues Mitch to Bodega Bay with a pair of lovebirds, the atmosphere subtly begins to change…but you must listen closely. When the first gull attacks her nearly 50 minutes into the film, the tension begins to quickly mount. Melanie sheds her furs and Mitch soon discovers the true person beneath. Then the birds attack.

Hitchcock deftly builds each scene: Melanie at the schoolhouse, as a murder of crows secretly gathers behind her; a tiny finch flitting out of the fireplace moments before the torrent; Mitch’s mother’s quest for her neighbor which reveals broken china…and much more. The running and terrified children, the burning town, Melanie ensnared in a phone booth, and the townsfolk who silently huddle with vacant birdlike stares are sequences that are shockingly unforgettable.

The human race has become imprisoned in a cage while the birds now hold dominion. His editing is masterful: from reaction shot to exposing bits of information, cut by cut until the bloody reveal quickens the pulse. The plot only falters with exposition as an ornithologist just happens into the dinner to discuss the impossibility of the attacks, a bible quoting drunk, and the quick accusation against Melanie barely clips the narrative’s tail feathers.

In the final act they take refuge in Mitch’s farmhouse and suffer the frenzied onslaught, bloodied and emotionally spent, while Melanie is reduced to a burnt cinder, raped by the piercing beaks and raking claws. The two caged lovebirds still nestle together, untouched by madness, a fleeting but hopeful metaphor for Melanie and Mitch…and the whole human race. But the ending is a bleak mise-en-scene as their car sputters through a parting sea of raptors, the world once again belonging to the dinosaurs. This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but a chirp. Final Grade: (A)

All reviews copyright Korova, Ltd. Visit Alex at his Home Theatre Blog, http://korovatheatrepresents.blogspot.com/

For some reason I seem to remember seeing this in black and white a few years ago, but that could just be my imagination, or me thinking of some of Hitchcock’s other works.
Any fan of classic horror/suspense is more than familiar with the work of Alfred Hitchcock, especially The Birds. This film has probably been more than responsible for scaring people away from buying birds as pets.
Now, this isn’t your typical blood and gore type horror film, it’s more cerebral, but there are a couple of scenes where the handiwork of the birds is clear.
Released in the 60s, you know that the effects are not going to look that realistic. Having said that, I half expected to see strings from the birds, but didn’t see any. The birds, for the most part, looked real.
I would have liked to have had creepier music during the bird attacks. Maybe its just me, but when killing or attacks happen, you expect to hear something to set the mood, such as in Jaws or my personal favorite Hitchcock film, Psycho. I may be alone in thinking that, though. It just seemed to not give the mood to the killings and attacks that there could have been.
Acting here isn’t the greatest, but obviously, one doesn’t watch this expecting Gone With the Wind.
One thing that does bother me, and many that have seen this picture is that it is never revealed why the birds are attacking. Normally, I’d say, whatever, but they don’t even seem to try to figure it out. If I was all of a sudden getting attacked by birds out of nowhere, I’d be trying to figure out what was going on, wouldn’t you?
As a fan of classic cinema, I thoroughly enjoyed this film, though, as with most suspense films, the first 30 min or so didn’t really do anything but drag on, where the last 30 min tried to cram too much in. They could have done a better job with the balance, if you ask me. Still, this is one of the films you should watch before you die, unless you’re already afraid of birds, especially seagulls and crows.

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After watching this film, I never thought I could go out and just enjoy a walk in the park or jogging in the late evening, who knows what bird I might get angry and it will bring its entire family and terror on me…not to say if it’s a crow!

The Birds is one of Hitchcock’s best films. There were remakes for this film but nothing compares to the original one, this one!

The plot is very understood and easy to understand but it’s a very terrifying one when you think of it. It tells the story of small town that out of nowhere being attacked by birds of all kind. What starts as something small and not too harmful turns to a living nightmare for the people in town as the number of attacks keeps growing as the number of birds attacking the people up to death. It’s not safe to walk outside now and there is no solution to this terror.

I remember after watching this film thinking to myself this is a brilliant thriller-horror film and that now I am not going out when there are birds around.

This film strikes fear into your heart, it sounds and looks good and even in its old white and black color, it delivers the terror it’s supposed to.

A brilliant horror film by one of the brilliant directors ever lived. This film is a classic and if you haven’t seen it, it’s a must. Besides that, even if you’ve see the remake, it’s no comparison to the original one. Watch this 1963 film and then feel for yourself what terror really is. All in all, this is a masterpiece by a brilliant director who knew how to deliver fear and thrill from the screen to our lives. Who ever in his minds dreamed he could find his death by attacking birds? Only a genius like Hitchcock can think it and deliver it to screen, which he did and which you must see to believe and experience yourselves.