The Birds Scene 13 Summary

  • Melanie pulls up at the school and goes inside.
  • The students are singing; Melanie gets Annie's attention, and Annie signals to her to wait a minute.
  • So, Melanie goes outside and sits on a bench.
  • In what is probably the most famous scene from the film, Melanie sits on a bench in front of a jungle gym.
  • You see one bird fly behind her and land on the jungle gym. Then, a few more.
  • Then, more.
  • Melanie smokes, oblivious to what's happening.
  • The kids are still singing an endless and really irritating nursery rhyme.
  • More birds.
  • Melanie looks up and sees a bird flying, follows it with her eyes, and sees it land on the jungle gym, which is now completely covered with birds.
  • Look closely during this scene; can you tell that some of the birds are fake or stuffed? Only a few are alive and moving.
  • Melanie, now completely freaked out, goes back into the school, where they're getting ready to go into the playground.
  • Melanie gets Annie to close the door and shows her the crows through the window.
  • Annie and Melanie decide they have to get the kids out.
  • Don't they have a basement? Take the kids into the basement. Don't have them go outside where the birds are!
  • But, Melanie and Annie don't listen to Shmoop.
  • Instead, they organize a fire drill and get the kids to go outside to the road.
  • Where, inevitably, they're mobbed by the birds.
  • But, if Annie and Melanie had been smarter, you wouldn't get the scene of the birds chasing the kids and getting in their hair, etc.
  • Sometimes, kids have to suffer for art.
  • A girl falls down and loses her glasses, and Cathy and Melanie run back to try to help her.
  • They get to a car and roll up the windows.
  • The birds mob the car; Melanie honks the horn to try to get them to fly away, without success.
  • Then, they all fly off for unknown reasons.