The Bite #51

Why THE BIRDS is a Masterpiece, JORDAN PEELE’S US Crushed Its Debut Weekend, and More!

March 26, 2019

In this Issue:

Horror History: What’s Missing Makes The Birds a Masterpiece
Image of the Week: Alternate Argento
Tiny Bites – This Week’s Best Horror Headlines
The States of Horror: Washington + West Virginia
Things We Love: Alien: The Play
Hey, That’s Us! – Shudder in the News

HORROR HISTORY: WHAT’S MISSING MAKES THE BIRDS A MASTERPIECE

The unexpected beauty of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds, released this week in 1963, lies in two things it doesn’t have: a soundtrack and an explanation.

Point out that The Birds doesn’t have a soundtrack, and people will look at you cockeyed. Hitchcock did tap world-class composer Bernard Herrmann, but not to write music. Instead, he served as the film’s “Sound Consultant.”

Consider the restraint demonstrated by that choice: Herrmann had just done iconic scores for Hitchcock’sVertigo, North By Northwest and Psycho, and was at the top of his form scoring episodes of The Twilight Zone and Harryhausen movies like Jason and the Argonauts. To hire Herrmann and not have him score the movie was either genius or lunacy.

Instead of a traditional score, Hitchcock and Herrmann worked with German technician and composer Oskar Sala to create a wall of flaps, caws, calls and clacking beaks for the film. This unnerving soundscape warps natural noises into something sinister and malignant, especially if you see The Birdson the big screen with a good sound system.

And no ornithologist in a lab coat shows up to tell us why the birds have turned homicidal; it just happens. The lack of an explanation in Evan Hunter’s (a.k.a. hard-boiled crime writer Ed McBain) screenplay creates more anxiety, becoming a blank canvas on which we can project our own fears. That’s a profoundly subversive narrative choice to make in a movie with deeply Freudian overtones, namely another creepy mother/son relationship threatened,Psycho-style, by the arrival of another Hitchcock blonde.

Combine those bold choices with the film’s deliciously ambiguous ending, genius matte work by Albert Whitlock, and top-flight (ha!) performances, and it’s easy to see why The Birds became the template for a flood of “Nature Strikes Back!” movies in the 1970s, like Day of the Animals and Frogs. Yet none of those films could equal Hitchcock’s inventive restraint, so none has surpassed the power of The Birds.

IMAGE OF THE WEEK

Alternate Argento

Dario Argento’s 1977 supernatural horror film Suspiria inspired a 2018 reimagining — as well as this retro alternate poster by artist Marc Schoenbach.

TINY BITES

JORDAN PEELE’S RECORD-BREAKING US, REMEMBERING TWO HORROR ICONS & MORE

We bid a sad farewell to Larry Cohen, director of It’s Alive, Q: The Winged Serpent and beloved master of low-budget genre filmmaking.

We also mourn the passing of legendary SFX artist John Carl Buechler, director of Troll,Cellar Dwellerand Friday the 13th: The New Blood.

Jordan Peele’s Us crushed its debut weekend, withthe biggest opening ever for an original horror movie —and third biggest period, behind 2017’s Itadaptation and last year’s Halloween sequel. It’s also filled with horror movie references, big and small. (C.H.U.D., anyone?) And let’s talk about that ending…

Peele is so next level, he’s even dropping horror movie Easter eggs into his Us press tour wardrobe. (Wow, just…wow.)

People are still reeling from the bloodbath on Sunday night’s “shocking, savage” episode of The Walking Dead.

Misery‘s Annie Wilkes is headed to Castle Rock.Kathy Bates won an Oscar for her memorable portrayal in the 1990 film. Lizzy Caplan (Cloverfield) will play her in the series.

According to The Washington Post, horror is must-see again. Of course, it always was.

Bloody Disgusting counts down the top 75 theme songs in horror TV and movie history. (Making us curious what 76 was.)

A design firm wondered what Jaws, The Shining and other horror classics would look like as children’s pop-up books. The answer is…adorable!

THE STATES OF HORROR: WASHINGTON + WEST VIRGINIA

By Sam Zimmerman

Today’s States of Horror follows the bouncing ball toward a seminal haunted house in Washington and everyone’s favorite bit of West Virginian folklore.

Washington: The Changeling

The Changeling is quite simply one of the great haunted house movies. The film, about a grieving New York composer who relocates to a haunted manor in Washington state is an essential of supernatural horror, exemplary in its mood and iconic for its creepy bouncing ball. The story was inspired by playwright Russell Hunter’s mysterious experiences at a mansion in Colorado, which supposedly involved a spirit guiding Hunter to its own remains. Director Peter Medak’s version takes place in Seattle, but was mostly shot in nearby British Columbia, Canada.

West Virginia: The Mothman Prophecies

It’s set in West Virginia. It’s about West Virginian folklore. And yet it shouldn’t surprise anyone to knowThe Mothman Prophecies was shot in… Pennsylvania. Still, we must shout out the eerie film, based on an urban legend that began life in Point Pleasant, West Virginia in 1966. The Mothman, described as a winged, bird-like man with glowing red eyes, captured the imagination of the Mountain State and the country after a cluster of supposed sightings, and the collapse of a bridge in 1967. A Mothman statue currently stands in Point Pleasant and, outside of Prophecies, the creature remains a fixture in books, video games and television.

THINGS WE LOVE: ALIEN: THE PLAY

In space, no one can hear you scream bravo!

Sixteen students and three teachers in New Jersey won the internet this week for their inventive stage version of Ridley Scott’s Alien, complete with space suits, a face hugger, and a Giger-styled Xenomorph. Images and video from the two-night-only North Bergen High School production went viral over the weekend, with stars like Elijah Wood, Paul Scheer and Adam Savage singing the teens’ praises. Even Fox’s official @AlienAnthology account chimed in, declaring “We are impressed!” So are we! Amazingly, the school doesn’t even have a drama department. Here’s hoping some enterprising producer finds a way to bring this one to Broadway.