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"Wrongly Mocked Today": The Special Effects were Historic -- and Not ALL Effects

posted 3 years ago by ecarle (14979)
4 replies | jump to latest

I've always had trouble with both the screenplay for The Birds(and its dialogue) and some of the acting.

But I never had a problem with the many great action-horror-fantasy set pieces in the film.

So I'm always a little demoralized to find people rather mocking those effects today.

The first thing to remember is that the special effects were not ALL special effects. Hitchcock had a bird trainer named Ray Berwick lead the work in training REAL LIVE birds to do some of the stunts in the movie -- like the one that crosses the sky and knocks the gas station attendant unconscious, or the one that bites at Rod Taylor's hand when he creeps slowly out of his house at the end.

As history has also (chillingly) shown us, quite a few live birds were thrown at Tippi Hedren -- and even tied by strings TO Tippi Hedren -- for the final attack on her in the upstairs bedroom.

Meanwhile, when real birds weren't used, some puppets were used (for head shots and close-ups) and a lot were animated in the 1963 version of CGI. And get this: for the (great) shot from a God's eye view of seagulls hovering over and then diving down into Bodega Bay, cameramen filmed REAL birds hovering and diving down for bread off of California seacliffs and then animators matted THOSE birds into the Bodega Bay sky(over a mix of a painting of the town and real fire.)

I think that shot of the seagulls diving down onto Bodega Bay(mid film) and the final shot of hundreds of different types of birds "as far as the eye can see" (REAL birds matted into different slots of a screen) are two of the greatest shots in the history of movies, period. And they hold up GREAT today.

The work with the crows landing on the jungle gym at the school(real birds) and then filling the sky to attack(animated birds) are just a little behind those two other great shots, to me.

Hitchcock was coming off one critical hit in Vertigo, one big audience hit in North by Northwest, and one blockbuster worldwide phenonmenon in Psycho. He had to top himself. With the script and actors...not so much.

With the set-pieces, and the effects and the HARD WORK of The Birds: absolutely.

Imagine: Hitchcock's script -- aside from the sometimes poor storyline and dialogue -- had ALL those bird set pieces in it -- more set pieces than had been in North by Northwest or Psycho. And he DID it. He got birds to "act," to fly on command, to attack on command, to stand still for long periods, to BITE - -he got them to do whatever he wanted. A modern cinematic miracle -- with no computers.

As Hitchcock said at the time" "Making The Birds was such a grueling task that I promise you..I shall never make a movie called 'The Birds' again."

Special effects men listed The Birds alongside the original King Kong, certain disaster movies of the 30's , and the Ray Harryhausen stop action films as "historic": markers to where special effects would go.

Yeah, some of the effects aren't that great, or have "dated."

But the achievement stands -- and so do some of the greatest individual shots in movie history.

PS. It is said that a small team of "little old ladies" HAND PAINTED some of those birds into the frames, taking weeks to do so.

[–] greenbudgie (2355) 2 years ago

It's good to see someone defending the effects achieved in 'The Birds' and commending the time-consuming efforts that were taken.

Poor Tippi Hedren in that attic bedroom. I may not like her character Melanie but I do feel for her being shocked by being suddenly confronted with some live birds.

Tippi Hedren in that phone booth is another scene I wouldn't to see done in any other one. Another classic scene I reckon.

Perhaps some of the shots in the scene with the schoolchildren didn't work that well. But that scene had to be included despite it's flaws.

The other day I watched a fan edit of 'The Birds' on You Tube. It has a running time of 22 minutes. I was interested how the editor condensed the film down and how they edited some shots out of sequence to the full movie.

[–] christomacin (4655) 2 years ago

Not sure how much a a fan someone is if they edit the film down to 22 minutes... lol. That seems a bit of a backhanded compliment to me... unless it was a "tribute video"... that's different.

I've always felt that there was something a bit more, I don't know, meaningful, that Hitchcock was trying to say in this film. It almost seems like a metaphor (perhaps?) for nuclear war and the need for reconciliation (represented by the love birds) and understanding (represented by Mitch, Melanie, and the Mother).

[–] greenbudgie (2355) 2 years ago

They do give 'fan edit' as part of the title for that abbreviated version I saw on You Tube. I was interested to see what the editor would include and what they would omit. You have to know the film fairly well to appreciate what they thought was important and of course to follow what was going on.

Also interesting was your comments on possible meanings that Hitchcock may have incorporated into the film. He wouldn't admit to it of course. He always say something like "It's only a film." But it was the Atomic Age so that type of thing must have always been in the minds of directors at that time, especially in the horror and sci-fi genres. People were very fearful of the dangers those times posed. I reckon that you are right in suggesting that reconciliation is very much in the message of the movie if one needs to be taken from it.

[–] christomacin (4655) 2 years ago

Well, he did make a film about the Cuban Missile Crisis (Topaz), so there could be something to it.