The film rights to Daphne du Maurier's short story The Birds were up for sale in 1961. Alfred Hitchcock, who had directed the adaptation of her Rebecca to an Oscar for Best Picture, loved the story but passed on the chance to produce and direct. Universal picked up the rights and hired Bernard L. Kowalski as director based on his work with Attack of the Giant Leeches. But with the decline in natural horror features during the decade, the film flopped when it got released in 1963, and no major ones in the genre were produced in the next decade.
Ten years later, Universal decided to have a go at the creature feature again by buying the rights to Peter Benchley's then-unpublished novel Jaws. The young Steven Spielberg really wanted to direct but was rejected in favor of veteran Stanley Donen. Known for musicals like Singin' in the Rain and Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Donen wanted to do a horror film to connect with more contemporary audiences. Spielberg instead did the comedy Lucky Lady with Gene Hackman. Both critics and audiences viciously hated Donen's film, while Spielberg's was an unexpected success and gave him free rein to do other projects such as Close Encounters of the Third Kind, leading him on the path to be one of the most commercially and critically successful directors in history.
What would happen if Hitchcock directed The Birds and Spielberg directed Jaws? Would there be a resurgence in natural horror? Could pretty much anything natural be considered scary?
Ten years later, Universal decided to have a go at the creature feature again by buying the rights to Peter Benchley's then-unpublished novel Jaws. The young Steven Spielberg really wanted to direct but was rejected in favor of veteran Stanley Donen. Known for musicals like Singin' in the Rain and Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Donen wanted to do a horror film to connect with more contemporary audiences. Spielberg instead did the comedy Lucky Lady with Gene Hackman. Both critics and audiences viciously hated Donen's film, while Spielberg's was an unexpected success and gave him free rein to do other projects such as Close Encounters of the Third Kind, leading him on the path to be one of the most commercially and critically successful directors in history.
What would happen if Hitchcock directed The Birds and Spielberg directed Jaws? Would there be a resurgence in natural horror? Could pretty much anything natural be considered scary?