Special Features:
All About The Birds - A Documentary on the Making of the Film   �  Deleted Scene   �  Storyboards  �  Tippi Hedren's Screen Tests   �  Cast and Crew   �  Newsreel Footage   �  Theatrical Trailer  �  Description of Original Ending

FILM
It had been at least ten years since I last sat down and watched The Birds. In that time Jurassic Park was released along with every other CGI based special effects movie. I was worried that the bird effects were not going to live up to my memories of them, but after watching the DVD I have to say for the most part they actually still work.

Tippi Hedren plays Melanie Daniels, the daughter of a rich newspaper man, who after a brief meeting with Mitch Brenner (Rod Taylor), in a pet store decides to pursue him up at his weekend home in Bodega Bay. We are given a small hint of things to come as Melanie leaves the pet store, but the full impact is only felt when she arrives in Bodega Bay. She rents a small boat to cross the bay and on the way back from Mitch's house a seagull dive bombs her and opens a nice cut on her head. It has started. Slowly the bird attacks increase to a near apocalyptic level. The story is about that simple, which does not seem like much, but it is Hitchcock's visual style that pulls this movie through.  

There are a couple of specific sequences that are as good as anything Hitchcock ever committed to film. The best scene in the film occurs while Melanie is sitting outside the schoolhouse waiting to talk to the teacher. She lights up a cigarette and we see a crow land on the jungle gym behind her. Hitchcock cuts back and forth between Melanie smoking the cigarette and the jungle gym, which is slowly filling with crows. We get a extended shot of Melanie and finally when the audience can't take it any more he cuts back to the jungle gym, which now has hundreds of crows resting upon it. Melanie suddenly notices the crows and as her and the teacher try to get the children to safety, the crows attack. This is the one scene where the special effects falter. It is very obvious that the crows in the shots from behind and in front are animated. 

My other favorite sequence in this movie is where Jessica Tandy discovers her neighbor has been killed in a bird attack. She walks into the house and immediately senses that something is wrong. As she gets closer and closer to the neighbors bedroom we see various bird remnants. She finally looks into the bedroom and Hitchcock gives us a triple cut (when you see it you will understand) to the blank eye sockets of the neighbor. That Hitchcock was still coming up with new editing techniques to express things so late in his career attests to his genius.

VIDEO
My guess is that without a full restoration, similar to Vertigo and this years Rear Window, that this film cannot look any better. Colors are nicely reproduced, although they occasionally fade in and out. This is pretty typical of a film from this time frame so I can't complain much. Grain levels are again about what you would expect from a film from this time frame. Digital artifacts are kept to a minimum. Overall, an extremely well balanced transfer.

AUDIO
The sound design in this film is actually quite complex, which makes it even more disappointing that they did not go back to the original sound stems and create a new 5.1 Dolby Digital sound mix. Not bad for 2.0 mono.

EXTRAS
The documentary on the making of The Birds included on this DVD is one of the most informative supplements on a film I have ever seen. The only documentary that I have seen that tops this is Under Pressure: The Making of the Abyss, which I actually find more interesting than The Abyss. This documentary details every aspect of the film. From early scripts and pre-production to the world premiere. I know that Tippi Hedren ended up having a lot of problems with Hitchcock in the years after this film was made, but it is nice to see that the thirty years since have kind of healed the wounds. It seems that she is now at the point where she understands how she fits into cinema history because of this film and Marnie. The only thing that keeps the supplements from a full four stars is the lack of a commentary. Be sure to check out and absolutely stunning Tippi Hedren playing Grace Kelley in her included screen tests. I can see why Hitchcock became so obsessed with her.

SUMMARY
Although this may not be one of Hitchcock's greatest films, it is well worth seeing.