What is with Birds???

[Joe Bob Jim]

I just watched The Birds yesterday on AMC and the ending confused me. It left so many questions, all they did was safely drive away from the house! You never know if they are all right, why the birds attacked and stuff like that! Or did Alfred ment to do that to get me to watch another film or the movie again??
BTW I really liked The Birds, thought I thought the first hour to be kinda dull. After the kids got attacked at the party things really got good. /ubb/biggrin.gif

[Joe Bob Jim]

The question the stumped all!!!! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

[PackBacker]

Welcome to the world of Hitchcock films. By the way, you may want to put a spoiler alert on your posts in the future if you intend to give away vital plot details or movie endings.

[cow]

A lot of Hitchcock movies have question endings like the birds. Thats why i love them so much, they leave they question "what the??" when you are through watching them. He lets you think of what the meaning of it all was, thats what make his movies so darn good!

[krylonman]

I actually did an English report on this movie...the ending, even for Hitchcock, was unusual because he was trying to create a poem on film. The structure is vaguely like stanzas in a poem, with bird attacks punctuating them. Hitch spent lots of time graphing out peaks and valleys in dialogue and action from the script and plastering the graphs all over the walls! The ending, like a poem, doesn't wrap up the story but simply stops after following a train of thought for a while. Just a hint though, this movie isn't so much about the birds as it is about the parts in between...there are quite a few Hitchcockian clues and themes that become noticeable when you think about it...

[AntonioDelLago]

There are several theories out there about the ending of THE BIRDS:

(1) the title creatures were a representation of Lydia (Jessica Tandy) and her possessive clinging of grown son Mitch (Rod Taylor)...thus the Oedipus attacks on Taylor's would-be paramours Tippi Hedren and Suzanne Pleshette. Being "allowed" to leave at the end of the film was symbolic to Lydia's acceptance of Tippi's Melanie character.

(2) In the alternate twist ending, when the survivors reach San Francisco, the Bay bridge is covered with the title creatures!

(3) Tippi's city-bred lovebirds were intrusive on the natural Bodega Bay environment (i.e. the Bay birds didn't like strangers!).

(4) Tippi's Melanie character was a stranger as well. See #3. Her imposing sexuality awakened the birds' violent side? Did they sense her dark side?

I don't subscribe to any of those theories. They are merely the major arguments concerning the film's ambiguous ending (which I loved, by the way!).


[This message has been edited by AntonioDelLago (edited 06-10-2001).]

[A.J. Hakari]

"The Birds" realized they had no more to fear from the humans. After the attack on Bodega Bay, nature had triumphed over man, and the birds now had control over the townspeople.

[bloodyVALENTINE]

HEY! Enough of the psychology-crap...

Lets just agree that it was a cool ending... the 'real meaning' died with Hitchcock back in 1980, along with the most dependable, brilliant director of a century.