When The Birds was
released fifty years ago, there probably weren’t a lot of folks who thought it
would one day receive a full-length study all its own. Critical notices were
mixed, many movie goers felt hoodwinked by its open ending, and it made
little more than a third of what Alfred Hitchcock’s previous film, Psycho, earned at the box office. Even
members of its own cast and crew viewed The
Birds as seriously flawed (star Rod Taylor would rather be best known for Young Cassidy, whatever that is). Such
is the fate of a film seriously ahead of its time. Within a few years, the
history books would tell a much more favorable tale regarding The Birds (its 1968 TV debut was the
highest rated of any feature film to that point), and tales don’t get much more
favorable than Tony Lee Moral’s new book The
Making of Hitchcock’s The Birds.
Moral’s book is both a close inspection of The Birds’ genesis, production, aftermath,
and meaning and a contrasting perspective of a more recent reputation Hitchcock
and his film have acquired. Last year, Julian Jarold’s film The Girl presented a highly unfavorable
portrayal of Hitchcock’s filmmaking methods and his alleged sexual obsession
with star Tippi Hedren. Moral goes out of his way to dismiss all of that as
sensationalistic mythmaking with reminiscences from other members of the
production team who never witnessed any inappropriate behavior. What happened
in private between Hitchcock and Hedren may only be known by them, but the fact
that he sneak-attacked her with live birds, and proceeded to do so for five
days straight, while filming the attic attack is widely known. Moral dismisses
the sadism of this incident as all for the greater good of capturing a great
scene. Yes, the results are great, and as a huge Hitchcock fan, I certainly wasn’t hoping for confirmation that he was a creep, but at the very least it’s a bit insensitive
to downplay the very real emotional toll it took on the actress.
Although that particular detail left a slightly unpleasant
taste in my mouth, the mass of The Making
of Hitchcock’s The Birds is
excellent and illuminating. We see Hitchcock’s intense care in fashioning the
minutia that brings realism to this fantastical film, such as having Melanie
play a bit of Debussy on a piano to indicate she has talents a purely
two-dimensional fashion plate would not or ensuring the locals at Tides
Restaurant would be distinct individuals instead of interchangeable small town
stereotypes. We learn of ideas discarded from the finished product, such as
screenwriter Evan Hunter’s plan to include a murder mystery angle, and weird
bits of trivia, such as Suzanne Pleshette getting pooped on during her death
scene or Jean Cocteau’s dying wish to see The
Birds. While Moral’s downplaying of Tippi Hedren’s difficulties and his
reference to the director as “the Great Man” indicate an uncritical agenda, the
author does not shy from including a few unfavorable quotes, particularly from
Rod Taylor, who believed his director “had no streak of tenderness for
relationships between men and women.” These details give us a bit more
perspective of the man behind the flock, but those looking for a lurid, psychological
dissection of Alfred Hitchcock won’t find it in this book, which is generally
reverent and concerned with the day-to-day process of making and releasing one
of cinema’s most brilliant shockers.
