The Birds (1963) *

 

*****/*****

Yes, I am getting this out of the way. Some of the bird effects are dated and not as potent today but I remember adults talking about how terrifying Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds (1963) was when they saw this back in the 60s. My mother was a child then and she regaled me with how the film left her mortified. And why wouldn't it? Hitchcock shows crows and gulls swooping down to attack children running from a school and earlier during a birthday party. At a gas station and diner the birds once again go berserk as adults this go-around are bombarded by violent beaks and claws, with children not exactly spared. Tippi Hedren, as San Francisco socialite, Melanie, is at one point trapped in a phone booth as gulls charge right at the glass, causing breaks, interfering with her exiting through the door until potential boyfriend, and Bodega Bay hometown boy, Mitch (Rod Taylor), arrives to pull her away to safety. What causes the birds to attack and halt, attack and halt Hitchcock will not define. Why Suzanne Pleshette's schoolteacher, Annie, is found dead at her door, clearly mangled by overwhelming attack (Veronica Cartwright's terrorized and traumatized little Cathy details the harrowing account of the iconic gas station explosion causing birds to go crazy, engulfing Annie, who pushed Cathy into her house, saving the child's life) but at the end Mitch, Mitch's mother, Lydia (Jessica Tandy), Cathy, and seriously injured, Melanie (recovering from the horrifying attic attack where birds get into Lydia's house through a hole in the roof) seem to walk to Melanie's convertible without triggering their wrath is a mystery we are left to ponder. No, I will not be seeing "Lands End"(1994) so I choose to be left curious.

Besides the bird attacks mentioned, the film scene of the crows collected on the monkey bars as Melanie approaches the school is a masterful piece of nerve-racking suspense. This is why Hitchcock is called the Master of Suspense. But that final sequence...that is the good stuff! He drags it out, too. Mitch goes into the garage, moves Melanie's car delicately outside and then quietly gathers up his brood to escort them out while all the birds surround them. You see that we can consider ourselves at the top of the species ladder all we want but all it would take is a flick of the switch and humankind would be brought down more than a peg or two.

The film starts out as any flirty building Hitchcock romance with Mitch and Melanie at a San Francisco bird store (with an actual second floor with stairs so Hitchcock could move his camera around with his customary applicable stylish aplomb). She's known as a prankster, a media darling with a wealthy newspaper owner father. Mitch is a lawyer opposing her over a prank. He's looking for lovebirds for Cathy's birthday and Melanie clearly is attracted to him despite their fussy exchange regarding pranks and misbehaving. A naked swim in Rome comes up in conversation plenty. Mitch's mom, Lydia, recently lost her husband and any woman that might be a love interest is a threat in her mind to take him away. Loneliness is a big concern to her. Well, the birds sure alters how she views Melanie. Lydia finding a victim with his eyes gouged out rocked her boat for sure! But Melanie does nothing to prove that she would ever be a threat to take Mitch away from her.

The opening is about getting Melanie to Bodega Bay. I love that this is the same place as where "The Fog" is set. Anyway once she brings the birds, in her boat, arranged at a store, trying to get back to town on the river, a seagull scratches her head. That and a bird crashing into Annie's door that night foreshadows the oncoming attacks that sends locals into terror and hysterics.

Despite mechanical and animated birds used, the story itself and how Hitchcock groups them into massive, dangerous flocks, with unnerving sound effects, just imposes on us that dreaded what if.