media studies-birds analysis (finished)

                                       The birds-1963

"The birds" is a thriller movie directed by Alfred Hitchcock and was originally written by Daphne du maurier, this movie stars famous actors such as Rod Taylor, Tippi Hedren and Suzanne Pleshette.
This movie although a thriller follows a different set of rules to the standard movie plots of this genre as opposed to the normal villains or threats being psychopaths or crazed individuals, this movies villain is instead NATURE, this movies villain is the birds specifically, the "heroes" do not know it is coming and neither do the audience as it is completely unexpected for birds to attack humand where as we are used to psychotic killer or crazed gunmen and Hitchcock uses this very much to his advantage, the audience are not expecting the threat to be a bunch of seagulls but at the same time this is why it is frightening as the thought of animals turning against humanity is terrifying for humans as there are so many birds in the world that they could easily overpower humans three times over and that coupled with the fact that the setting is in bodega bay so there is no where to run except from one bridge which is later blocked off in the movie, this gives a sense of isolation and loneliness to the audience as there is no where for the protagonists to run to, they have to stay there and put up with the birds as there is no where to go.
While thrillers generally have a main villain in the movie, this is not true of "the birds" while the civillians and towns people do have a threat to them and it does appear as nature itself is bringing down her wrath upon them there is no real set villain although like traditional thrillers the "heroes" do still have to overcome obstacles and traps which the villain sets up in some sense, an example of this is when the birds seem to like constantly surrounding them and enclosing them either within their homes or within a building where a lot of them are present at the time during these points in the movie the heroes then have to find a way to either escape or to get rid of the birds and scare them away, while this movie does see them scaring away the birds a few times it is mainly them either escaping from them or it is with sheer luck in which the birds decide to leave. 

Another key action in which thrillers are known for is in their use of suspense and the birds is no different if anything they use the tool of suspense very well especially in the scene where the crows are slowly gathering behind the main woman of the movie, while we can slowly see them gathering and starting to form together possibly for another attack, the character cannot see them behind her so this creates a great deal of suspense and can lead to Many of the audience even shouting at the screen to alert her to the danger that is coming her way, of course we know that something bad is going to happen and that for us makes it even worse when it does actually happen and the character begins to freak out. Hitchcock liked to use a lot of things which had different underlying meanings such as the children singing inside of the school, while at first it seems innocent and sweet at first it is also one of hitchcocks devices, the signing of the children is seen as almost satanic and is in direct contrast to the evil of nature as displayed by the birds, it is almost like the children are signing satanic hymns to the birds even though it is just simply a child's school song, while on the subject of sound it is worth noting that throughout the whole film there is no non-diegetic sound except for one electrical music score but nearly all of it is just diegetic and all of it is contrapuntal meaning that any noises or music or talking that you hear in the movie is also what the characters and the actors in the movie are hearing themselves, this works very well for a movie like the birds as it puts you in the shoes of the men and women seen in the movie and