no explanations

Rating: 8/10 (31 January 2008)

'The Birds' finds Alfred Hitchcock at the end, and at a peak, of a most productive and impressive run of films, which for most people began with 'The Man Who Knew Too Much' in 1934 and continued through to 'The Birds' in 1963. There were Hitchcock films before and after, of course, but for this thirty-year period, he averaged a film a year with very few duds. 'The Birds' is full of Hitchcockian touches and is a genuinely disturbing film. Not for the first time, the director lulls us into thinking we are watching a perfectly ordinary, one might even say pedestrian, comedy/drama; this time about a lawyer/playboy (Rod Taylor) and a rich society playgirl (Tippi Hedren) and the flirtatious back-and-forths of their budding relationship. You know, she can't stand him so she finds any excuse to see him, etc. The other main characters are the lawyer's possessive mother (Hitchcock did have a thing for possessive mothers), his annoying little sister, and an old flame (played by a young Suzanne Pleshette). Early on in the film, the birds themselves only intrude on this little soap opera at odd moments, just enough to make the audience go 'hmm.' But soon they are the focal point after a series of attacks in the California coastal community of Bodega Bay cannot be explained. And this is precisely where Hitchcock plays 'gotcha' with the audience. At no point in the movie is there even a hint of a logical reason for the bird attacks... the 'why' that people so desperately want and need to know when faced with a crisis beyond comprehension. The characters in the film become pawns of sorts to the madness, as incapable as the audience of understanding what's happening. They are also incapable of defending themselves. (It never occurs to anyone, even at the end, to get some shotguns and shoot the little bastards.) The juxtaposition of the humdrum with the carnage of the bird attacks is jolting at times. In perhaps the most sadistically brilliant scene, the domineering mother drives alone to a neighbor's farm to find it deserted. As she walks through the farmhouse, it appears largely undisturbed at first, only small tell-tale signs present themselves... a cracked wall hanging here, a feather there. Then she comes across the farmer, slumped to the floor in pajamas, and in a series of quick-cut close-ups, we see his bloody eye sockets where his eyes have been pecked out. The special effects themselves are variable, from quite believable (the above-mentioned scene) to almost laughably phony. Hitchcock films are notorious in this regard (see his next film, 'Marnie,' with the painted backdrop of a battleship in the final scene) and it's hard to know if this is intentional or not. The famous director did have a wicked sense of humor. Most horror films concern characters who are unalterably caught up with the terrifying forces that menace them. In 'The Birds,' the characters try their best to ignore them, to no avail.