JustJared reports that there has been “talks” for Naomi Watts to possibly star in The Birds remake. Thank Christ Michael Bay is not directing the reboot, but instead it will be Diederik Van Rooijen. Supposedly this version will not adhere to Hitch’s interpretation, but rather more closely to the Daphne du Maurier short story [read online here].
I’m all for Naomi Watts in this version. There are so many up and coming hot young blondes who could bump her. You could go for Margot Robbie, for instance. But by now, Watts has earned blonde icon status in Hollywood – Mulholland Drive and King Kong solidified that status. But the movie The Birds, Hitch’s version of it, injected the story with twisted sexuality which is missing from the short story. In Hitch’s version, Melanie Daniels (Tippi Hedren) comes to down – a sexy, rebellious blonde up to mischief. Her mere appearance there seems to upset the whole dynamic – jealousy from a mother (of course), an “old maid” (ditto) and the usual Hitchcock tropes have swallowed up what the original story was about. This version, if they really do go off the short story, will be more about the horror elements — nature vs. man — than they are about the sexual dynamics at play in Hitch’s version. Watts could play either version but I suspect if they were going the Hitchcock route they would cast someone sexually threatening. But either way, it’s an intriguing project so far.
