Tag: Tippi Hedren

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In an interview conducted towards the end of 1969 with Roger Ebert, Alfred Hitchcock described how he and his team of production staff and artists achieved one of the most famous shots in The Birds. Establishing a bird's-eye view over Bodega Bay, the aerial shot depicts a mob of gulls as they swoop into frame and down towards the...

A couple of early incidents featuring agitated lone gulls - a swift strike as Melanie Daniels (Tippi Hedren) prepares to dock her motorboat, and another which annihilates itself in the Brenner front door - progress into a fully-fledged attack on Cathy Brenner's (Veronica Cartwright) birthday party, as the youngster celebrates turning twelve. Later that evening a swarm of sparrows invade the Brenner home...

Analyses of Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds have typically tended in two directions. There is the film's at-the-time innovate use of special effects, which were added by Lewis Hampton and Ub Iwerks, but which required much in the way of planning and shooting: careful storyboarding, trained gulls, numerous camera angles, and then plenty of editing to bring together different shots. And...