The Birds (1963)

Well Deserved Praise

Brilliant and touching

Amateur movie with Big budget

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

3/4The Birds is the subject of an age-old debate that cinephiles often engage in: is The Birds a good or an overrated film? I am one of a neutral party that agrees with both. To me, The Birds is everything that it promised to be, nothing more.There is no debating this: it's not Hitchcock's masterpiece. The plot is this: A woman works a pet shop, she gets an order for love birds, she travels to a coastal town to get the love birds...Birds go wild and ravage the place while she falls in love with the town hunk. Why do these birds go mad? This is one of the many questions the movie will not answer. If you care enough to analyze it, be my guest. This movie does not challenge you to find answers, as it works perfectly fine if you suspend your disbelief.However, the plot is not where the movie earns its merits at all. The film is very surreal, intense, and mildly frightening as Hitch's signature spice. If anything is to be said about this movie at all, the way Hitch shot the Birds was flawless as far as camera work. The way he captured their spirit of destruction through the rule of thirds is truly cinematography in Hitchcock tradition. To me, his portrayal and control of the Birds is what makes the film. The cast (especially Tippi Hedren) are very vibrant characters full of life and genuine emotion. He was able to convey these characters without the use of a musical score was very adept, although it should not go unnoticed that in the school scene the children sing a rhyme to build up suspense. Every component compliments one another in The Birds. There is truly no wasted talent.In conclusion, I find The Birds to be a good movie. Most of all, I find it to be an important milestone in cinematic history simply for the way the birds were captured on-screen. This does not have my vote for Hitchcock's best, or even his second or third best, but it's great for what it is: a landmark movie and a fun thriller.

"The Birds" was a film that struck wonder in many a movie fan when it came out. How did they film those bird attacks? Did the birds really attack people, and if so, how did they get them to do that? Or, what kind of special effects could make those scenes seem so real?The film was a smashing success for Alfred Hitchcock who had established his place in film history as a tremendous director and creative movie maker. Most especially of thrillers that often had frightening parts. No one could make such films better. Ironically, Hitchcock never won an Academy Award. But, of the 70 films he directed, he received five nominations. The Hollywood Foreign Press however, bestowed two Golden Globes on Hitchcock. He received a 1958 Globe for his television series, "Alfred Hitchcock Presents," which aired from 1955 to 1962. And, he won a Golden Globe for his 1972 film, "Frenzy."The cast all are fine in "The Birds," and Americans got their first look at Tippi Hedren. Everyone in the cast does a good job conveying a sense of fear or fright about the birds after their first attach. The plot, filming, direction and editing all are superb. The location shots in Bodega Bay, California for scenic and very good. "The Birds" uses special effects for longer time than any other film movie that comes to mind. It received an Academy Award nomination for special effects for 1963. The various scenes of attacking birds look so real. But they were all shot at the Walt Disney Studios. Disney's master animator, inventor and special effects guru Ubbe Iwerks did the job. The process used different background screens for shooting and then different developing processes. The finished product looks so real because it overlays the shooting of real people and birds. "The Birds" was the third movie Alfred Hitchcock made from stories by Daphne du Maurier. The English novelist and playwright was one of the most prolific writers of the 20th century. More than a dozen movies have been made from her novels and short stories. Besides "The Birds," Hitchcock directed two of her earliest novels for the silver screen. "Jamaica Inn" of 1939 starred Charles Laughton and Maureen O'Hara, and "Rebecca" of 1940 starred Laurence Olivier and Joan Fontaine. "Jamaica Inn" is a crime mystery and thriller set on the Cornwall coast – the westernmost county of England. Hitchcock and others distanced themselves from the film soon after it was made. Apparently, Laughton had bought the film rights from du Maurier, with the intent to use it to promote himself. He had control over the whole film and one can see that his presence overwhelms it at times. His forced changes in the script and his character departed a great deal from the book, and du Maurier wasn't happy with the film. But, the film was a success. Moviegoers didn't seem to mind and may even have enjoyed Laughton's exaggerations and overacting. Anyhow, it was Hitchcock's last film in England, for he went from there to Hollywood. Laughton also went to Hollywood for "The Hunchback of Notre Dame," and he took Maureen O'Hara with him. She had been a little known actress before Jamaica Inn, but "Hunchback" made her a star. "The Birds" was what people regarded in the mid-20th century as a good "date" movie. That's because the frightening scenes would usually lead to a girl nestling close to the boy, and the boy "protecting" her with his arm around her shoulder.

I cant say much about The Birds (1963) because everyone knows why its so good, everyone knows why its so effective, well written and well directed. Its just a classic horror film that manages to be scary and creepy despite its absurd premise.I believe this is one the movies that inspired all those killer animals films, but this one is one of the better ones in that genre. Probably because most of those other films lack the kind of writing that this one has, they don't develop their characters well enough so by the time something happens to them you really don't care, in The Birds you do care and you root for these people even if they aren't the most likable people on earth. Also, the bird attacks in the film are really well directed, another aspect those movies lacked.

I have two birds and they are so cute, but I found that a group of birds was a scary in this film. Why did the birds attack people? I think human beings control birds and they are the lower class in our daily life. For example, they are basically in the cages. Their real symbol is freedom. Though they want to fly freely, they cannot do that because they are in their cages. It means that human beings violate their rights. Wild birds can, as a matter of course, fly like they want to. However, crows are poor existences because they are said "the Messenger of the Dead". There are a lot of people that hate the crows (But I adore them). However, if the birds became a band, they could control us, people. But it is impossible that the birds attack the people badly like that in reality. This impractical occurrence was interesting and fascinated me. Symbol of freedom is birds. Human beings dominate some birds. However, the birds revenge and dominate us in this film. The paradox is also very interesting for me. I like this movie because I love strange, horror and psycho thriller stories. Moreover old works' qualities of graphics are not clear rather than current that. It still felt me creep.