Birdemic 3: Sea Eagle

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source: Birdemic 3: Sea Eagle

"Birdemic 3 came out today, and Nguyen is already planning a fourth. But all I can think about is Evan Husney's sad portrait of a man who desperately wants to be a respected filmmaker but is so unable to let go of the movie that made him a cult hit that he sabotages himself." This is what Ed Glaser wrote on Twitter alongside a clip of James Nguyen in a documentary from Vice, displaying his apparent inability to move on from the Birdemic phenomenon -- while leaving us confused whether he understands how deeply hilarious his movie about the attack of the killer bird GIFs truly is, or at least why this is so. After all, the previous movie was trying to be funny on purpose. Alas, it is typical for a "so bad that it's good" filmmaker to lack the self-awareness to understand why people were laughing in the first place (just look at what happens when Tommy Wiseau, director of the legendarily inept The Room, tries to make us laugh INTENTIONALLY with The Neighbors) and sure enough, Birdemic 2 was just plain unwatchable. Now, for some reason, Birdemic 3: Sea Eagle IS actually kinda funny. Nguyen leans into what made the original movie so transfixingly terrible (the constantly shifting audio quality, white balance, and saturation seem all the more jarring with the improved picture quality) but isn't trying to be cheeky about it. The impression I got was that of a filmmaker who, deep down, does think this all looks really cool and that these sub-PSA "insights" about global warming and environmentalism are genuinely profound (one is reminded of bad movie legend Neil Breen, who still plays everything straight, possibly because he knows how hilarious that makes him). But then, the movie does come with the additional (depressing) undertone generated by what we know from the aforementioned documentary: this is all Nguyen has in him. I was pondering this as I watched, but promptly forgot about all that when I heard a track by Melodysheep (composed for his sublime YouTube doc about life in the cosmos and its inevitable fate) among the stock music. He's got taste, that James Nguyen.

I know film's sequels don't usually follow the success, but when the first movie was so bad I expected better. This isn't really a movie, it's more of a global warning propaganda video. So much emphasis on global warming and the destruction of the earth, it's actually quite depressing. Forget the wooden acting and the bad writing, and the fact that sometimes the scenes are interspliced so badly that sometimes the volumes change and the lighting, so you can tell they've just stitched 2 scenes together. I should have know what to expect, but even after seeing 2 other films of this quality, I really didn't expect it to be this bad. It's far worse than the other 2 put together. Personally I got to the end and was actually looking forward to the end of the world, just so I don't feel compelled to watch any more birdemic movies!!

Severin Films, who released the original Birdemic, wants to move past Birdemic 2: The Resurrection and introduce a new and better take on the birds. Or so they said, but after a decade, not much has changed. Gerontologist Evan (Ryan Lord) and marine biologist Kim (Julia Culbert) have learned from her collecting ocean water samples that the water has become too acidic due to global warming. That means that the birds, always those CGI birds, are mad. But first, there's romance. Director and writer James Nguyen did it all himself this time and man, it's certainly a movie. There's nearly an hour about climate change where every conversation and even the artwork references it. If you think the media isn't spending enough time on this issue, this movie is out to make up for it. It also has a lot to say about how good Vertigo is. There's also a lot about how Mr. Green, an Elon Musk-esque billionaire is our only hope. And then twenty minutes in, this movie remembers that it needs bird attacks and gives you bird attacks. To get there, there's a long karaoke slow dance scene, a space elevator and lots of making out. I think this movie has a brand name now that guarantees that lots of people are going to want to watch it. I can't believe that there was one of these movies much less three. There are long stretches without dialogue or even music. There's no real story until it's almost over. And by this point, either James Nguyen is in on the joke or so far into himself that he doesn't realize what he's making or probably both. In case you want to know where your money went when you bought all of those Al Adamson and Dennis Steckler box sets, you can see it on the screen here.

They got to make the trilogy even worse in this one. I actually like the first movie because of the "so bad it's good aspect", and Birdemic 2 added blood rain, zombies and a Piranha 3d (2010) reference scene but here there's no fun. Those things could save the second movie, which have a pretty terrible and boring screenplay aside that. But Birdemic 3 really starts at the 57 min mark, ending 20 minutes later. Before that, there is this 57-minutes long nonsense ramble about climate change and global warming (we've seen that in the first two, but not this long). There are no animations in this first section of the movie and the actors have absolutely ZERO charisma, unlike the actors from the 2 first movies. At the final minutes of the movie the main character of the first 2 reappears but he couldn't do much to save the day. Also, there is this a super stereotyped scene with a black guy playing a gangster or something, and it isn't funny at all, despite trying hard to be. YIKES!

I can be biased, as I am fan of bad cinematography, but I enjoyed this one even more than 2 previous. Style of Mr. Nguyen matures as a fine wine. The camera work, the sound, the special effects - it gets worser and worser. The screenplay, the nonsensical, stiff dialogs, the terrible performance of the actors do not change. Some people insist on not calling it a film (movie), and I see where they are coming from. Most of its running time is used by characters walking, driving or running, and talking to various people about global warming. Its message, although important to hear, is delivered with such a lack of subtlety, it gives the opposite effect. After watching it in the cinema in Wroclaw, Poland, I wanted to burn couple of tires and pollute the nearest Odra river. I am giving 1 for the overall quality and not for the enjoyment.

Long story short, it's the EXACT same plot of the 1st movie and everything you'd expect. The audio was everywhere, the lighting was everywhere, the dialog and acting was everywhere, which by the way always sounded like generic AI bots talking to each other...yup it's all here. Movie starts out with loud happy music with the infamous driving scene, then cuts away to a very quiet scene where guy meets girl with wacky dialog audio. Also, the lighting was so bad I couldn't tell if there was something wrong with my TV, probably because there was so much over exposure and bad filtering. The CGI, same thing, the birds are flying GIF images. Like I said before the plot is the same, the 2 characters have everything going for them, go on dates, dancing with live music, and get in bed. No birds until 57 minutes into the movie and out of nowhere they attack. What's interesting about this one is that it's actually better than the first 2, but that's not saying much. It's probably the most preachy and had the most music and alcohol. And yes there is a hanger scene. So the question remains....is it still so bad it's good? Short answer, YES and its pretty funny and entertaining.

Let me start out with this... If you liked Birdemic 1 & 2, do yourself a favor, and skip this entry. I'm dead serious. Don't bother. You thought waiting 30mins (Birdemic 1) or 45 mins (Birdemic 2) to see the bad cg birds was bad?? Try waiting an hour in an hour and 23min long movie, and somehow, the birds look actually worse than they did in the prior two installments. Hell, Alan Bagh doesn't even show up in the movie until just after the birds. But you know what you do get to see?? The absolute worst & stiffest acting humanly possible by "paid professionals." Once again, James Nguyen follows the same plot as he did the last two times, but somehow... worse. Each scene is some random person spewing exposition at the lead actors, sounding like they're just reading wikipedia articles held up by James off scene. Each character preaches at length in each scene, making the movie seem to last an eternity, despite being just a few minutes. Hell, there is literally a scene where we watch the lead man watch tv for 5 minutes, with the camera panning around him & room, as he eats a sandwich. Before that, we get to watch both leads stand on a pier & watch a 5 man protest of wikipedia reading & unemotional yelling for another 5mins. Honestly, skip this movie. Unless you're going to see it in person, with Alan & James there, in the theatre, so you can ask them "Why?"

The film making presented in this movie is horrendous. Somehow Nguyen has managed to regress as a film maker over his 4 feature films. This movie is not even so bad it's good. It is painful to watch and offers almost no entertainment value as it is somehow a worse retelling of the first film. Somehow the writer/director managed to cram more hamfisted and clunky dialogue than his previous works so that Birdermic 3 manages to be both simultaneously extremely boring and also insulting to the audience's intelligence. There is nothing new here to warrant viewing this film as the same issues of the prior 2 films in the series are also present in this film. The plot is literally exactly the same, the same terrible bird special effects are used and the same awful editing is present throughout. As a result, Birdemic 3 has no entertainment value whatsoever. Save your money and put on the first film with the saturation turned way down.