The Birds (1963, Alfred Hitchcock) 60

(first viewing in about 12 years.)

Not a whole lot to say about this classic, except that I'm shocked, shocked to realize I never noticed the obvious and profound influence it had on Night of the Living Dead, on both a macro and micro level. As a zombie movie aficionado, I'm quite embarrassed. And it's not like it's subtle, either: Look, there's the dead body in the empty farmhouse; there's the radio report from the outside world; now there's the heroine, mute and slightly crazed by the attacks, gripping the mantel as if to hold on to reality; and there's the yokel, whose philosophy is "just shoot 'em all". I feel like the last to know and the first to cry.

And of course, there's the hero boarding up the house from an unnatural attack, the staple image that nearly every zombie movie is built upon. (It's become such a cliché, that when a lesser zombie movie like Resident Evil comes along, I have to give it some credit when it avoids using it.) It's an image of apocolypse, seen from a peculiarly specific vantage point, which is probably why Hitch ditched the original ending, a drive through a devastated Bodega Bay. (The devastation on the characters' faces is enough.) For me, this image, almost an archetype, of the Boarded-Up House is one of the great inventions of the cinema, and it sure as heck looks like The Birds was there first. (I would've thought it was The Last Man On Earth, the first "I Am Legend" movie, but that came out a year later.)

While The Birds is no doubt an historically important movie, let's face it: it's a bit slow. I understand the reasons behind the careful buildup, but unfortunately, these characters aren't really worth the effort. The Tippi Hedren--Rod Taylor--Jessica Tandy conflict is a real yawner, especially since Hedren's character is a bit vague. What happens is that a drama slowly morphs into a horror film, yet there are no strong links binding the two genres to each other. (Unlike, say, Cat People, which is both a horror movie about lycanthropes and a drama about a disintegrating marriage, but it's impossible to separate one from the other.) While there does seem to be a connection between the repressed feelings of the characters and the bird attacks, it remains in the airy realm of symbolism, never touching down onto concrete reality.