3½ stars (out of 4)
Judy Irving's intimate documentary "The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill" is the kind of well-crafted, character-driven work that wows regional film festival crowds and public television audiences but seldom gets seen outside those circles.
Shadow Distribution and Landmark Theatres, then, should be complimented for having faith in Irving's affectionate film portrait of Mark Bittner, a wandering ex-musician who cares for a flock of discarded and escaped parrots in San Francisco.
So few worthy documentaries gain any momentum without controversy or edgy subject matter ("Fahrenheit 9/11," "Tarnation"). Yet the deceptively simple, G-rated "Wild Parrots" needs only to lift the lid on Bittner's daily life and we're sucked into a sociological study of fugitive conure parrots. Even if you're not a bird or pet person, Bittner makes a fascinating subject who evokes empathy and gives "Wild Parrots" a dramatic anchor.
An articulate philosopher-type and squatter on the Bay Area's Telegraph Hill, Bittner spends his days hand-feeding and maintaining flock histories of the cherryhead conures who call San Francisco home (many are former pets, wild birds who hated captivity, released by or escaped from their overwhelmed owners). Not all the parrots are cherryheads, though. The flock's is a blue-crowned conure, Connor, a loner and outcast who metaphorically mirrors Bittner.
Through careful editing of what must have been miles of film, Irving depicts a community of bird personalities around Bittner, including the feathered lovers Picasso and Sophie, the ailing Tupelo, and Mingus, a cranky conure who nests under the birdman's bed.
Just when the film threatens to tip over into anthropomorphic sentimentality (as Bittner assigns his birds human characteristics), Bittner himself takes on the issue.
"My problem was not with anthropomorphism," he says. "Rather, it was with anthropocentrism, which is seeing human beings as the center of the universe."
He's introspective and scientific-minded enough to see the parrots as birds, not as people or extensions of his own needs but as creatures adapting outside their native habitats in Ecuador and Peru. Though Irving smartly avoids making too fine a point on it, the kinship between Bittner and the flock carries her film into unexpected philosophical areas.
In another director's hands, "Wild Parrots" might have been a trite, too-precious documentary about a man's love for non-native birds in offbeat San Francisco. Thankfully, Irving's insightful, glorious little documentary reveals larger personal truths for her subject while exploring a hidden society of unwanted parrots.
redler@tribune.com
'The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill"
Directed, produced, filmed and edited by Judy Irving; original music by Chris Michie. A Shadow Distribution release; opens Friday at Landmark's Century Centre and Renaissance Cinemas. Running time: 1:23. MPAA rating: G.
Movie review: 'The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill'
By Robert K. Elder
TRIBUNE STAFF REPORTERMarch 30, 2005
