Continuity mistake: A blond boy in a light brown shirt is attacked by a crow and goes from having no blood on his neck to having a lot of blood smeared on his neck between shots. (01:14:10)
The Birds (1963)
Directed by: Alfred Hitchcock
Starring: Jessica Tandy, Rod Taylor, Suzanne Pleshette, Tippi Hedren
Continuity mistake: As everyone runs out of the restaurant, the bushes on the left of the building that were there before are gone. (01:26:10)
Visible crew/equipment: As Melanie drives up to have dinner at Mitch's, the reflection of the cameraman on the inside of the window can be seen moving in the upper-left hand portion of the screen. (00:32:10)
Trivia: Tippi Hedren actually received a cut on her face by a bird in one of the shots.
Trivia: When we see the school children running away from the birds, they were actually running on a treadmill with Bodega Bay footage added in the background.
Trivia: There is no musical score for the movie.
Mother in Diner: Why are they doing this? Why are they doing this? They said when you got here, the whole thing started. Who are you? What are you? Where did you come from? I think you're the cause of all this. I think you're evil. Evil!
Melanie Daniels: They're coming! They're coming.
Mitch Brenner: Aren't those lovebirds?
Melanie Daniels: No, those are, uh, red birds.
Mitch Brenner: Oh, I thought they were strawberry finches.
Melanie Daniels: Oh, yes. We call them that, too.
Question: When the birds attack the town a gas station attendant is hit by a bird and drops the gas hose he is using to fill a car. The gasoline flows down the street and under a car; a man drops a match and lights the gas causing an explosion. Why didn't the gas pump shut off when the man dropped it?
Question: What is said on the radio in the car at the end of the film?
Answer: "The bird attacks have subsided for the time being. Bodega Bay seems to be the centre, though there are reports of minor attacks on Sebastopol and a few on Santa Rosa. Bodega Bay has been cordoned off by roadblocks. Most of the townspeople have managed to get out, but there are still some isolated pockets of people. No decision has been arrived at yet as to what the next step will be, but there's been some discussion as to whether the military should go in. It appears that the bird attacks come in waves, with long intervals between. The reason for this does not seem clear as yet."
Question: What's making the birds go insane and attack people?
Answer: It is never explained, probably because it would ruin the mystery of the film to spell it out.
If you are a Hitchcock fan, you pay attention to dialogue. They mention quite often that it started Melanie's arrival, of which she brought 2 caged birds. The rest is implied.
Answer: None of the characters knew why the birds attacked, or the reason it was confined to the one town of Bodega Bay. The incident was so isolated that the outside news media was barely aware it was occurring or knew its severity, so there was no investigation into it at the time. Alfred Hitchc0ck's explanation was that the birds were rising up against humans to punish them for taking nature for granted.
Join the mailing list
Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.
Answer: The movie takes place in the 1960s, so presumably gas pumps worked a bit differently back then. This is also a small town and probably the gas station had not modernized. There may not have been automatic shut-offs, or if there was, it was faulty.
raywest ★
The automatic shut off is in the handle of the hose. When a person grips the handle they have to lift a levered switch to allow gas flow; the lever is spring loaded so that if it is released the gas will stop flowing. I have looked at older antique gas pumps and they are all the same; even the visible glass gravity flow ones. If that hose was dropped the the gas should have stopped flowing.
michael g