Alfred Hitchcock Suspense

Among other animal imagery, birds appear frequently throughout the story in times of crisis. The birds often foreshadow dangers that lie ahead. For instance, when Robert's team takes a wrong turn, "the fog is full of noises"(80) of birds. Then the birds fly out of the ditch and disappear. Robert and Poole know that "[there] must be something terribly wrong...but neither one knew how to put it into words. The birds, being gone, had taken some mysterious presence with them. There was an awful sense of void--as if the world had been emptied" (81). The birds return and when Robert nears the collapsing dike and "one of the birds [flies] up cut[s] across Robert's path" as if it is trying to prevent him from going any further. Robert does not heed the warning and almost dies in the sinking mud.

The Hitchcock film titled ‘The Birds’ is set in Bodega Bay, California. For no apparent reason, as soon as a woman arrives in the area, birds have been attacking the residents, and causing death and destruction. In one scene, where Melanie Daniels (portrayed by Tippi Hedren) is stuck inside a house alongside Mitch Brenner (portrayed by Rod Taylor), and his mother Lydia, and his younger sister Cathy, trying to protect themselves from another relentless wave of bird attacks.

     The Birds, the movie was directed by Alfred Hitchcock and was based on the short story “The Birds” written by Daphne du Murrier. If you would have read the book and then watched the movie, you would see that very few things are the same. In both the short story and the movie flocks of gulls, robins, crows, and sparrows join each other. This is really weird because different species of birds never work together. The story and the film both have the same climate. It is cold and chilly; “the ground is frozen and it will be a black winter.” The climate gives the versions of the story a creepy and suspenseful feeling.

Psychologists have suggested the idea that correlation does not imply causation. In The Birds, viewers find themselves unable to identify the purpose or the cause for the birds’ attacks. Hitchcock does not want us to know the answers either, since Hitchcock marvels at his ability to make viewers question his films and struggle at truly enjoying without fully understanding them. Although this essay cannot find a cause for the attacks in the town or to the characters that seem to be innocent like the children and the old man in the farm, it should shed some light on the correlation between the timing of the attacks near the Brenner family and Melanie and their internal struggle. The symbolism of the caged birds versus the free birds, the Jocasta complex Lydia struggles with, and the imagery of the light versus darkness when the birds attack represent the journey Mitch and Melanie face in trying to be together.

This essay is a comparison between the short story, “The Birds” by Daphne du Maurier, published in 1952, and the 1963 film, The Birds by Alfred Hitchcock. The story, in brief, was about a man named Nat, and his family. They lived on a farm and had to protect themselves in their house when the bird population spontaneously attacks. Although du Maurier’s story and Hitchcock’s film portray the same major conflict and theme, the other major story elements are very different.

“Our mouths opened and shut and we froze where we sat. I suppose we could have honked and waved and it wouldn’t have raised any more pandemonium than this poor mother already had to deal with but instead we held perfectly still. Even Turtle, after a long minute or two the quail got her family herded off the road into some scraggly bushes” (96). The birds are significant symbolism in this book. They often appear in the book to symbolize Turtle; Kingsolver did this to show Turtle is a strong survival instinct child. First, when Taylor took Turtle to doctor and discovered that she has been abused and raped. As she makes this discovery, she sees a bird nest on a cactus. This shows that Turtle, in spite of her surroundings she keep persists. Also, when Turtle met the robber, a sparrow got caught in Lou Ann’s house, the bird getting scared shows the Turtle’s confusion and fright. But sparrow survives and leaves the house; this shows that even though Turtle is going through confusion she will survive. Finally, the quote shows the moment when Lou Ann and Taylor found a family of birds on the road. This quote symbolizes how Turtle is satisfied with her small family, feel safe, and she is happy.

Throughout the novel, the bird is continually used to connect Edna’s status. In the beginning the caged bird shows that Edna is trapped by the cage of society. She eventually moves out of Mr. Pontellier’s house, yet moves into the pigeon house. She is still trapped under the grasp of society.

Although a lot of the story is pretty straight forward, she does use literary devices to help the reader understand the life of Birdie a little better. For example, in the end of the story she describes the vision of herself on the swing set outside of the hospital in saying, “Each time, the girl went fuzzy like an image on the television set with poor reception.” This simile allows the reader to really see what she saw or felt because we all can picture that type of image. Another time she uses a simile saying, “The swing is swaying gently, as if someone had just been on it.” These subtle literary devices help the reader to understand little things about the story in order for them to see the situation Birdie is in. However, there are not as many metaphors or a huge amount of other literary

“Birds bring beauty into the world,” Mrs, Bundy tells a distraught Melanie Daniels. But do they? In the film,”The Birds,” directed by Albert Hitchcock, Melanie Daniels chase's lawyer Mitch Brenner to the small town of Bodega Bay, gifting him a pair of lovebirds for his sister. Melanie however, gets caught up in the rampant bird problem that plagues the town when she arrives. Hitchcock creates suspense in the movie by using the element of dramatic irony, in order to instill a sense of helplessness into the audience as they watch disaster unfold before the characters of the picture.

One of the women made the comment that Mrs. Wright used to be pretty and happy, when she was Minnie Foster not Minnie Wright. This is just the beginning of realizing that she was just pushed to far into depression and couldn't live up to John Wright's expectations anymore. The Wrights had no children and Mrs. Wright was alone in the house all day long. The women perceive John Wright to be a controlling husband who in fact probably wouldn't have children and this may have upset Mrs. Wright. They eventually find vacant bird cage and ponder upon what happened to the bird, realizing Mrs. Wright was lonely they figured she loved the bird and it kept her company. The women make reference to the fact that Mrs. Wright was kind of like a bird herself, and that she changed so much since she married John Wright. They begin looking for stuff to bring her and they find the bird dead and they realize someone had wrung its neck. This is when they realize Mrs. Wright was in fact pushed to far, John Wright had wrung her bird's neck and in return Minnie Wright wrung his.

This hugely increased the despair and shock, the feeling of loss even when a character is brutally murdered. Straight away Hitchcock begins to build our sympathies for Marion Crane. He uses several cinematic techniques to create a mise-en-scene. Mise-en-scene is everything a viewer can see within a certain frame and consists of many aspects. For instance, Hitchcock uses a high-angle, mid range establishing shot to put Marion in her context, and highlight her vulnerability.

Alfred Hitchcock’s thriller ‘Rear Window’ (Hitchcock, 1954) begins with the immediate use of mise-en-scène in order to establish a sense of atmosphere, equilibrium and the mundane, soon to be disrupted as the events of the film unfold and are observed through the eyes of the voyeuristic protagonist, Jeff. Setting, cinematography and various other expressive mise-en-scène techniques work together to influence the overall appearance of the film. Though, by taking a closer look, these techniques reveal the significance of the narrative and characters. In the opening sequence, Hitchcock’s original visual style provides signposts for the audience to recognize what will be significant in the future: instead of establishing what is only happening in the moment in time; mise-en-scène is used to suggest what is to come. This arrangement of the “Classical Hollywood” narrative - starting with the setting and characters in a state equilibrium - acts as a seemingly all-purpose, archetypal opening by establishing location and introducing character. Simultaneously we can see that this sequence is vastly different from the rest of the film: it is leading the viewer into a false sense of security – the calm before the storm – as Jeff soon happens to piece together information leading to the possibility that one of his neighbors murdered their wife. This sequence is one of the only moments in the film we see things the protagonist does not, thus this carefully constructed opening is preparing

Norman’s psychotic ways are also revealed through Hitchcock’s use of motifs. His repeated use of birds have an underlying meaning of Norman’s dangerousness. His hobby is avian taxidermy and in numerous shots birds are displayed in the background. A shot of when the mise en scene evokes his eerie connection towards his hobby is in the parlor. The parlor is decorated with his stuffed trophy birds mounted on the walls or on stands - an enormous predatory, nocturnal owl with outstretched wings, and a raven. Both owl and raven are in frame lurking behind Norman and representing his concealed character. Like the owl, he is a predator, in full attack mode on Marian. He also doesn’t wait until the daytime to kill her, he slays her in the shower at night like a nocturnal psychopath. As if with the raven’s knife like beak, Norman murdered Marian, following in the footsteps of killing when it is easiest.

He wonders why the birds are just waiting in the sky as if they are waiting for a command, why they are restless, and he thinks it is strange that they are little birds and they are the type of the birds that normally keep to their own territory and don’t have a history of attacking people . When he looks out toward the coast, he sees the birds flocking in his direction and he believes that for some odd reason, they are going to come down to the

In this scene, Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant) is with the his black car in the woods meeting Eve Kendall (Eva Marie Saint) and her white car after his “death.” In the film, it is planned that Eve shoots Roger with blanks and that they would meet elsewhere after Roger was pronounced dead. As Roger exits the car to meet Eve, the audience can see that compositionally the scene is divided down the middle. The trees in middle divides Roger’s world from Eve’s world. Hitchcock purposely had the scene set up to be parallel and symmetrical. Having Roger and his car on the left side and Eve and her car on the other side.