Birdman of Alcatraz | | Cast : | Burt Lancaster, Karl Malden | | Director : | John Frankenheimer | | Studio : | MGM/UA Video | | Format : | Black & White, Closed-captioned, Widescreen | | Released Date : | July 03, 1962 | | DVD Released Date : | March 06, 2001 | | Language : | French (Subtitled), English (Dubbed), Spanish (Subtitled), English (Original Language) | | Audience Rating : | NR (Not Rated) | | | BUY THIS DVD FROM AMAZON |
Customer Reviews
| Rating |  | | Date | July 17, 2005 | | Summary | Great Film but a fouled premise | Content
 | The man deserved to be locked up and have the key melted down.A typical 1960's feel sorry for the criminal film. You never hear about the people and their families who were hurt by this evil man. He was tried and convicted for a reason, even this film can't make the case that he got a raw deal. Considering the time and place. The prison system and Warden were very decent to him.
Anywhere else and he would of had a necktie party within the year of his killing his victim.
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| Rating | | | Date | July 08, 2005 | | Summary | DVD of Birdman of Alcatraz | Content
| I found this excellent and will order more from this site. I received in very short time as well. I'd refer this site to others and have. |
| Rating | | | Date | February 28, 2005 | | Summary | Follow your bliss! | Content
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Sensitive portrait about a recluse who became in a real authority in what birds behaviors concerns Eventually this activity will lead him to his bliss.
Lancaster made an accuracy role and so Eli Wallach with this original script. Absorbing work from beginning to end.
Once more the artistic gaze of John Frankenheimer allowed him to make such difficult and almost unique picture. One of the best American pictures ever made, that consolidated to this director as one of the finest and creative directors of his generation.
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| Rating | | | Date | January 22, 2005 | | Summary | A Critique of Penal System, Great Human Drama | Content
| Burt Lancaster won an Academy Award nomination and could easily have corralled another Oscar statuette to go with the one he secured two years earlier for his excellent effort in "Elmer Gantry" as he portrayed convicted killer Robert Stroud in "Birdman of Alcatraz." This was also a peak period for the film's director, John Frankenheimer, since in a five-year period beginning with this triumph he also scored big with "Seven Days in May," which also starred Lancaster, along with "The Manchurian Candidate" and "Seconds."
Stroud is depicted as a mamma's boy gone wrong who will not allow any fellow Leavenworth Penitentiary fellow inmates to look at his mother's picture or mention her name. He is sent to Leavenworth for killing a man in Alaska after the victim had beaten up a prostitute friend of Stroud's. The convict is then sent a hair's breath from the hangman's rope after he kills a prison guard in a rage. The explosion occurs after he has been told he would not be allowed to see his mother, who has journeyed from Alaska to Kansas to visit him.
Thelma Ritter, in a performance for which she received a Best Supporting Actress Academy nomination, battles zealously for her convict son throughout, and when he is sentenced to death she journeys to Washington, D.C. and obtains an appointment with First Lady Edith Wilson. President Wilson commutes Lancaster's sentence to life shortly before the execution is scheduled to occur. The result, however, is that the prisoner will spend the rest of his life in solitary confinement as a result of his hair trigger temper and homicidal propensities.
Lancaster verbally spars for the entire picture with his nemesis, prison warden Karl Malden, although they do achieve something of an understanding by film's end. Lancaster ultimately develops a world of his own in taking care of birds. A man of high intellect, he becomes one of the world's leading experts on bird diseases, and eventually is able to supply Malden with advice on his arthritic right arm.
The character arc revealed in the film is Lancaster losing his formidable shoulder chips and intense rage when he develops a fondness for birds that germinates into a full-fledged profession behind bars. He even launches a business with pet shop owner Betty Field, who marries him as well. Lancaster also develops an association with fellow solitary confinement prisoner Telly Savalas, who earned an Oscar nomination in the Best Supporting Actor category.
Ultimately Lancaster is transferred from Leavenworth to Alcatraz, the island-based high security federal prison near San Francisco. He is reunited with Malden, who is now warden there. While crushed that his move west compels him to give up his birds, Lancaster continues to read and supply advice concerning birds and humans. At one point he serves as peacemaker during the notorious Alcatraz prison riot. He also gets a chance to meet the man who has written a bestselling book on his life, played by Edmond O'Brien, who also serves as the film's narrator.
It is during his Alcatraz period that Lancaster becomes involved in preaching prison reform. When Malden sees the manuscript that Lancaster is writing critiquing the prison system he becomes initially insulted and enraged, then, after reflection, begins to see the validity of points being raised. Malden, tired after years as a warden in the prison system, dies shortly thereafter.
In addition to the earlier mentioned Oscar nominations for "Birdman of Alcatraz," Frankenheimer was also honored in the directing category, as was Burnett Guffey in the Cinematography grouping. Lancaster secured a major international honor by being named Best Foreign Actor for 1962 by the British Film Academy for "Birdman of Alcatraz."
While controversy continues to abide over whether Robert Stroud was realistically depicted in the film and mellowed to the degree demonstrated on screen, it is undeniable that "Birdman of Alcatraz" made excellent points in the dramatic category as well as in the ongoing discussion of how to deal with prisoners in the ongoing pursuit of helping them adapt to life both inside and outside institution walls.
Guy Troper wrote the script and Elmer Bernstein provided the musical score. The film's chief producer was Lancaster partner Harold Hecht. |
| Rating | | | Date | January 10, 2005 | | Summary | Birdman of Alcatraz | Content
| Obviously, in the hands of Hollywood the story of Robert Stroud, is going to be simplified and sugar-coated in order to make an entertaining and palatable movie for the general movie goer. Whatever the truth is about Robert Stroud, it is an interesting story, and in and of itself, the movie version is quite good. Bert Lancaster is a superb actor, and this is very evident in his role as Robert Stroud. Although I do have some reservations about how the truth was distorted for this movie, it is enjoyable and entertaining, and very much worth seeing. |
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