Fear of nuclear attack is apparent when the birds “cover the bay like a white cloud”, suggestive of a nuclear mushroom cloud. The Birds is a political allegory about the psychological violence of capitalism and the fear-mongering of the Cold War. San Francisco socialite Melanie Daniels (played by Tippi Hedren) pursues her love interest, Mitch Brenner (Rod Taylor) to his mother’s home in coastal town Bodega Bay where the birds inexplicably begin their attacks.ĭu Maurier’s text also offers a macro-critique of political systems. Hitchcock hired screenwriter Evan Hunter to rewrite the tale with only these attributes in mind, moving the action to northern California and featuring attractive, metropolitan characters.
Critic, Bernard Dick, notes that “Hitchcock was only interested in two aspects of du Maurier’s plot: a coastal setting suggesting isolation and, of course, the birds’ seemingly unprovoked attacks”. The politics in Hitchcock’s adaptation is ambiguous, although three interpretations have significant conceivability: is The Birds about the untold power of the oppressed class, a Cold War tale, an environmental critique or an anti-feminist psychoanalysis of female hysteria and matriarchal control?ĭaphne Du Maurier’s original novelette, The Birds, tells the story of a farming family, the Hockens, living in a remote part of Cornwall, where the community suffers relentless attacks by flocks of birds, so dedicated that they kill themselves in this pursuit. Hitchcock does this deliberately because the mystery of the attacks intensifies the horror of the film. Furthermore, the direction of the critique is not so obvious, as the cause of the bird attacks is more difficult to identify.
The birds are at the core of the conflict, holding a symbolic status of a disharmony. The Birds adaptation contains a more allusive and allegorical political meaning.
This blog breaks down the various theories about the film. However, no art form is produced in a vacuum - outside influences always affect themes and content. To many filmgoers, Hitchcock’s The Birds is a wholesome and simple adaptation of a du Maurier novellette. What is Hitchcock’s The Birds really about?
0 kommentar(er)
