Anche gli uccelli uccidono

This movie is a million things at once. Some may find that as a bit of a turn-off, but then that's what a cult classic film is really about, isn't it?

Brewster McCloud is a reclusive boy who lives in the basement of the Houston Astrodome. He has a short job as chauffeur for a miserly old man. He is looked down upon for his meek appearance and his quiet manner. He dreams of building himself a set of wings and using those to fly away from all this suffering.

That's how the film starts, anyway. There are three basic stories in the movie: (1) Brewster McCloud's coming-of-age story, (2) the parallel metaphor of Brewster McCloud's dream of flying away from worldly sorrow, and (3) the murders of people who mistreat Brewster and who all die with raven droppings on their faces.

The real irony of this film is how the character of the Lecturer keeps pointing out similarities between the characters and certain birds, and yet the ending comes around, and we learn how unlike birds we are. There is so much information about birds, you wonder if this was an adult remake of an after-school special.

Overall, I'll have to use the word most of the other reviewers have used: quirky. There are things which are very different. There is the Pythonesque beginning where, as a woman sings the National Anthem and the credits roll, she stops, tells the band to try again in the right key, and the credits restart as well as the singing. There are small bits such as when a police officer holds up a lighter when his partner says there's only one way to know for sure if there's marijuana in a cigarette. And there is my favorite character, the Lecturer, who lectures the audience about the behavior of birds while he himself starts making strange noises and begins pecking at seeds...

Brewster McCloud (Bud Cort), a young man with dreams of flying, lives in the fallout-shelter of the Houston Astrodome, where, with (perhaps) divine help, he is constructing a pair of wings. Meanwhile, a serial killer, whose victims are found strangled and covered in bird feces, stalks the city. The sometimes slapstick, sometimes subtle, comedy by Robert Altman has aged well (although it's now a showcase for the Texas city as it was in late-1960s). The cast, which is full of secondary players from Altman's breakthrough film MASH (1970) is excellent and there is a fun, self-referential cameo from Margret Hamilton (known to all as the Wicked Witch of the West). The film is dense with images (especially bird-themed) and dialogue as the strange, semi-mystical story plays out to an excellent ending. Probably not to everyone's taste (I was borderline for the first few particularly broad and crude minutes but then got caught up in the story and characters). An extra point is awarded for sexy Sally Kellerman's nude homage to her famously up-tight MASH character.

This film, televised in Denmark in the mid-seventies, made a great impact on me. The story of Brewster and his dream of flying was wildly funny and poignant. And why it has become so obscure makes me wonder. I have been hoping for an opportunity to see it again. It is truly a great film as is the instructor Robert Altman!

Bud Cort is the title character, an eccentric oddball secretly living in the Houston Astrodome who believes he has figured out how to fly like a bird. He is protected by a guardian angel (Sally Kellerman) with clipped wings. He then becomes a suspect in a series of murders of people who are found strangled and covered in bird droppings.

An aggressively quirky counterculture time capsule, many modern viewers will be turned off by the bizarre story and outre characters. I happen to like it, and rank it among Altman's best. I enjoy the cast of weirdos, from Shelley Duvall (in her debut) as a stock-car driving tour guide who falls for McCloud, to Michael Murphy playing a San Francisco "supercop" named Shaft who sports turtlenecks and piercing blue eyes, to Margaret Hamilton as one of the murder victims who is found wearing ruby slippers. Stacy Keach is unrecognizable under heavy old age make-up, playing a miserly parody of Howard Hughes.

It's hard to talk about a film as unparalleled as Brewster McCloud. It creates its own world out of element from the world we know so well. It plays with everything, including its self-consciousness about being a movie. It weaves together many threads into a lovely, heart-breaking snapshot of a moment in America.

The situation: The world has gone mad. The wicked witch is wearing the Ruby slippers, and has become a beloved social icon. Who wouldn't want to fly away?

Enter Brewster McCloud, a young man who plans to do just that. He is hiding out in the basement of the Astrodome in Houston, working on building his wings. The kind you wear. Like Icarus did. His plan is all feeling, very focused, but doesn't take him past the immediate "How?" He is under the tutelage and protection of a sort of Bird-Goddess/Angel (played by Sally Kellerman) who walks around wearing absolutely nothing but a red plastic raincoat. When she takes it off, you can see the long, curving scars where her wings were removed. She also drives around in a small red car whose license-plate reads "BRDSHT".

Lest you think I've given away too much, let me assure you this barely scratches the surface. Who is responsible for the wave of mysterious murders? What of the presidential candidate who's all over town, is he an assassination target? What is the connection with the horny young girl (Shelly Duvall, in her first movie role - I believe she was discovered by Altman when he attended a party at her house during the location shoot in Houston) who comes to visit Brewster but can't ever really get his attention?

A wonderful, under-rated film worth seeing.