Birdemic: Shock and Terror (2008)

Movie Info

Next time that city won’t screw with the CGI birds!!!

Rod (Alan Bagh) is on the verge of making it big.  He’s closing million dollar sales, and the company he works for has stock options that could make him a millionaire.  When he meets a former crush and Victoria Secret model named Nathalie (Whitney Moore), Rod and Natalie fall quickly in love.  With a start-up green company in the works and a new romance, Rod and Natalie are on top the world until the birds begin to attack.  With an ex-Marine named Ramsey (Adam Sessa), his girlfriend Becky (Catherine Batcha), and two kids named Susan and Tony (Janae Caster and Colton Osborne), they are fighting for survival.  As an ornithologist named Dr. Jones (Rick Camp) warns them, the environmental changes are causing hell with the world and the birds might be one of the first waves.

The CGI birds!!! Quick everyone grab a hanger to fight them!!!

Directed and written by James Nguyen, Birdemic:  Shock and Terror quickly became a cult hit.  Picked up by Severin Films for distribution, the critically destroyed film is widely considered one of the worst films of all time but has gained a loyal following of viewers and fans.

Birdemic is almost unwatchable.  The movie is bad all around.  The plot, the visuals, the audio, the acting, the birds can’t possibly get worse.  Nguyen has revealed that he was inspired by The Birds (Tippi Hedren is listed as a “star” of this film because her image appears on a TV), but he also has no formal training…and it shows.

The movie is dull.  The first hour has no birds (except some parrots that don’t do anything) and mostly involves overly long scenes of business office meetings (where everything is nice rounded numbers like $1,000,000 and $1,000,000,000) and really boring (and borderline creepy) dates which have Rod and Nathalie dancing to a really bad soul singer by themselves…then the birds show up.

Oh crap, the CGI birds are threatening to penetrate our bus!!!

In possibly the worst special effects ever, some computer generated birds (probably from the start-up disc of a 3D generator program) begin attacking…occasionally.  The characters will walk around, point at a bird, then run.  Then, they might go picnicking outside…since the birds just randomly quit attacking.  The birds also apparently have acid blood or something and crap fire because everything they hit forms badly computer generated fire…then they fly away…end of movie (hate to ruin it for you, but ruining it isn’t possible).

The movie also goes for a really bad “green” message.  The characters go see An Inconvienant Truth and decide it is a really good idea to drive hybrids.  The reason the birds are pissed off is the environment.  Fortunately, the “survivors” meet an ornithologist who explains it all to them including how SARS and bird-flu are caused by global warning.  They also meet a hippy guy in the woods who spouts the same message (before the woods burn down with that computer fire).

Well, that was weird…let’s go shopping for a hybrid!!!

The audio and editing goes to show what good film directors do.  There are jump cuts and hissing mics.  Surprisingly, I didn’t see boom mics, but that probably is because I’m not sure that they had a boom mic…it sounds like most of the audio was recorded from the camera mic.  You can’t hear what the characters are saying, the looped screeching of the birds is too loud, and the music drops in and out without any logic.  It also really doesn’t help that the movie was shot along the PCH…one of the busiest roads in California.  When the birds are attacking, cars can be seen just driving by.  Apparently if you are driving, the birds won’t bother you.

Birdemic is one of those movies you must see to believe.  It is awful but so hypnotically bad.  It is a modern Plan 9 from Outer Space or The Giant Claw.  It is all over the internet so I do recommend seeking it out (big fans can pick-up a Blu-Ray).  You probably can’t stomach it all in one sitting anyway so stop by, watch a few minutes, get to the birds, then go about your day horrified that anyone paid money for this to be made.  Despite all of this, Birdemic 2:  The Resurrection was released in 2013.