Wednesday, January 27, 2016

Birdwatching in Film

Birdwatchers, or as they call themselves, "birders", have never been properly depicted in film. To common folk, past movies about birdwatchers have been accurate enough, but to hardcore "birders", Hollywood is laughing stock because when it comes to accurate portrayal of birds in their movies, they miss the mark every time, apparently.

Nicholas Lund of Slate Magazine points out that after many big Hollywood blockbusters about specific subjects (such as Karate Kid with karate, or Top Gun with airplane flying) there is often a national excitement about the subject but that has yet to occur with "birding".

Two movies came out in 2014 about "birding":

A Birder's Guide to Everything (2014)

The Birder (2014)

But by far the biggest movie about "birders" was the 2011 blockbuster starring Jack Black, Steve Martin, and Owen Wilson, The Big Year (2011):

The Big Year (2011)

The issue is that none of these movies have brought "birding" to the attention of the masses and none of them have done an adequate job of presenting "birding" in an accurate fashion. 

The burden is on the young ambitious filmmakers of the world to make a captivating and accurate movie about "birding" that will make it the next worldwide craze.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Tom, this is really neat! Absolutely love your insight on the this important subject of birdwatching.