Birdy (1984) - Review

Birdy is a drama film starring Matthew Modine and Nicolas Cage. It centers around the efforts of Sgt. Al Columbato to help rehabilitate his childhood friend whom everyone refers to as "Birdy", for his fixation on birds throughout his adolescence. Sgt. Columbato is fresh from his initial recovery from facial reconstruction surgery caused by mines on the Vietnam battlefield and is desperate to regain a sense of normalcy after he himself starts to struggle with losing grip with reality as he tries to reach his friend.

Where Racing with the Moon took a look at the innocence of men before they go to war, Birdy picks up observing the effects of war on the men coming back. This could not be more true since Columbato is himself being observed for troubling psychological behavior while trying to bring his friend back from an already shattered state. Even without any flashbacks, Cage is able to show that Columbato and Birdy have a deep relationship, bringing out an emotional range that I praise in his later movies in one of his first feature films. Al and Birdy form a deep bond in their high school years after Birdy is confronted by local kids who play pick-up baseball in an adjacent lot. After some initial teasing, Al finally puts an end to the torment as he realizes that there is no reason for Birdy to be subjected to it; even though he initially strikes up a friendship to gain a profit by training carrier pigeons, Al sticks with Birdy as Birdy's fascination turns into an eventual hyper-fixation with avian life. I was deeply saddened by Birdy's development in the film, but not because he does anything negative - his fixations are constantly combated by his mother and other children, while there are few people in his life that offer him unconditional love and support (his father and Al). Because the flashbacks take place in what I could assume would be the 50s or 60s, due to the immediate Vietnam connection, mental health care was most likely stigmatized and not very accessible or welcoming for Birdy to achieve any diagnosis that would help him cope with society. The tragedy of Birdy, the character, is that at the start of the movie it is established that he may be too far gone already. Learning more about his fixation with birds cements this already revealed tragedy as Birdy's mind is too fractured and he has finally gotten his wish, which he has had since a teenager, to become a bird.

I was enthralled by Birdy. I didn't know what I was getting into by looking just at the poster for years, but I wasn't expecting a psychological drama. Modine's portrayal of Birdy throughout the film is captivating, especially when his portrayal of the nonresponsive Birdy is a vehicle of progression of character for Cage's Sgt. Columbato. Modine having to handicap himself, to force himself to strip away all emotion during the main plot is a testament to his strengths as an actor. The strength of Birdy is cemented in its abrupt ending, where the audience is left unsettled by the ambiguity. Has the psychosis ended or has Al succumbed to his own? The credits rolling immediately forces the audience struggle with this question, and has forced me to consider it as well for almost a week before sitting down to write this review. I wanted to have an answer as to what I believe the ending of the movie meant to generate a discussion, but nothing I could reason out was satisfying as a conclusion as the filmmakers intended. I will recommend this movie because of the tension that it is still able to generate in audiences nearly forty years after its release. Despite being one of Cage's earliest of movies, Birdy continues to showcase his potential as a leading man even as Cage featured in another pre-war drama (Racing with the Moon) in the same year.