Birdemic: Shock and Terror

James Nguyen’s breakout exercise in cinematic failure, Birdemic, was a success on all fronts. Its unique blend of Hitchcockian terror and Al Gore-ian philosophy is unprecedented and remains unsurpassed. It unfortunately fails the Mako Mori test as there are no female characters that have independent character arcs, but, there are no character arcs in the movie at all, so it’s at least equal in this regard. Surprisingly, though, it passes the Bechdel Test; two named women talk to each other about something other than a man: going pee. Don’t let this fool you, though. The main male character works as a high-profile salesman whereas the main female character works as a model. The women are much more likely to be nude at any given time than the men are. So, to ensure equality in sexuality, I have developed a new test that is specifically designed for such topics.

THE BIRDEMIC TEST:

For every sexually posed female, there must be at least one equally sexually posed male. For as long as the female is in underwear or is nude, the male must be equally in underwear or nude.

Birdemic, naturally, does not pass this test. It wouldn’t necessarily be better or worse if it passed the test, because it exists in such a state of perfection that no minor overhaul could change it. It does make me think that other, more judge-able movies should be held to such a standard.