Editing Dead Birds (1963 film)

{{Short description|American documentary film by Robert Gardner}}
{{Other uses|Dead Birds (disambiguation)}}
{{Use American English|date=January 2025}}
{{Infobox film
| name           = Dead Birds (1963 documentary)
| image          = Dead Birds (1963 documentary) cover or dust jacket art for film.png

| caption        = Cover or dust jacket art for film Dead Birds (1963 documentary)
| director       = [[Robert Gardner (anthropologist)|Robert Gardner]]
| producer       = Film Study Center of the Peabody Museum at Harvard University
| writer         = Robert Gardner
| narrator       = Robert Gardner
| starring       = Weyak, Laca, Pua
| music          =
| cinematography = Robert Gardner
| editing        = Robert Gardner
| distributor    = [[Documentary Educational Resources]]
| released       = {{Film date|1963}}
| runtime        = 84 minutes
| country        = United States
| language       = English<br>[[Grand Valley Dani language|Grand Valley Dani]]
| budget         =
}}
'''''Dead Birds''''' is a 1963 [[Documentary film|American documentary film]] by [[Robert Gardner (anthropologist)|Robert Gardner]] about the ritual warfare cycle of the Dugum [[Dani people]] who live in the [[Baliem Valley]] in present-day [[Highland Papua]] province (then a part of [[Papua (province)|Papua]] province known as ''Irian Jaya'') on the [[Western New Guinea|western half of the island of New Guinea]] in [[Indonesia]].<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=z7p36FdLYdIC&dq=dead+birds+robert+gardner+1963&pg=PA295 Nonfiction Film:A Critical History], p295, Richard Meran Barsam, Indiana University Press, 1992, {{ISBN|0253207061}}, 9780253207067</ref> The film presents footage of battles between the Willihiman-Wallalua confederation ({{ill|Wiligima|id|Wiligima, Wita Waya, Jayawijaya}}-{{ill|Alula, Indonesia|lt=Alula|id|Alula, Wita Waya, Jayawijaya}}) of Gutelu alliance ({{ill|Kurulu|id|Kurulu, Jayawijaya}}) and the Wittaia alliance ({{ill|Wita Waya|id|Wita Waya, Jayawijaya}}) with scenes of the funeral of a small boy killed by a raiding party, the women's work that goes on while battles continue, and the wait for enemy to appear.<ref name=":5">{{Cite book|last=MacDonald|first=Scott|author-link=Scott MacDonald (media scholar)|title=American Ethnographic Film and Personal Documentary|publisher=University of California Press|year=2013|isbn=978-0-520-27562-1|location=Berkeley|pages=68–74}}</ref> In 1964 the film received the Grand Prize "Marzocco d'Oro" at the 5th ''Festival dei Popoli rassegna internazionale del film etnografico e sociologico'' ("Festival of the Peoples International Film Festival") in Florence, Italy, the Robert J. Flaherty Award given by the [[City College of New York]], and was a featured film at the Melbourne Film Festival (now [[Melbourne International Film Festival]]).<ref>{{Cite journal|date=May 13, 1964|title='Dead Birds,' on Papuans, Wins Flaherty Film Award|journal=The New York Times}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://miff.com.au/festival-archive/films/festival/1964?page=2|title=Melbourne International Film Festival Archive|website=webpage of the Melbourne International Film Festival (MIFF)|access-date=20 February 2020}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.festivaldeipopoli.org/5-festival-dei-popoli/?lang=en|title=Festival dei Popoli - archives|website=Festival de Popoli|access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Anonymous|date=27 January 1964|title=Italian Film Prize Won by American|journal=The New York Times|pages=19|via=Proquest Historical Newspapers}}</ref>  In 1998, ''Dead Birds'' was included in the annual selection of 25 motion pictures added to the [[National Film Registry]] of the [[Library of Congress]], being deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" and recommended for preservation.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.loc.gov/programs/national-film-preservation-board/film-registry/complete-national-film-registry-listing/|title=National Film Registry Listing|website=Library of Contgress|access-date=22 February 2020}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Hooray for Hollywood (December 1998) – Library of Congress Information Bulletin|url=https://www.loc.gov/loc/lcib/9812/film.html|access-date=2020-09-25|website=www.loc.gov}}</ref> ''Dead Birds'' has come to hold canonical status among ethnographic films.<ref name=":22">{{Cite journal|last=Roscoe|first=Paul|date=2011|title=Dead Birds: The 'Theater' of War Among the Dugum Dani|journal=American Anthropologist|volume=113|issue=1|pages=56–70|doi=10.1111/j.1548-1433.2010.01306.x}}</ref><ref name=":62"/><ref name=":14">{{Cite journal|last=Ruby|first=Jay|date=1991|title=An Anthropological Critique of the Films of Robert Gardner|journal=Journal of Film and Video|volume=43|issue=4|pages=3–17}}</ref>

==Synopsis==
The film's theme is the encounter that all people must have with death, as told in a Dugum Dani myth of the origins of death that bookends the film.<ref name=":7">{{Cite book|last1=Barbash|first1=Ilisa|title=Cross-Cultural Filmmaking|url=https://archive.org/details/crossculturalfil00barb|url-access=limited|last2=Taylor|first2=Lucien|publisher=University of California Press|year=1997|isbn=0-520-08759-3|location=Berkeley|pages=[https://archive.org/details/crossculturalfil00barb/page/n386 404]}}</ref> The film uses a [[nonlinear narrative]]  structure of parallel or braided narrative that traces three individuals through a season of three deaths and one near-death as relayed by an expository voiceover that describes scenes and the thoughts of the film's protagonists.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Nichols|first=Bill|title=Introduction to Documentary|publisher=Indiana University Press|year=2010|isbn=978-0-253-22260-2|edition=2nd|location=Bloomington|pages=167}}</ref><ref name=":14"/>   The film's establishing shot, an extreme long shot, tilts and pans over the Baliem valley from left to right, following the flight of a bird across the village, its cultivated fields, and the fighting ground.<ref name=":62">{{Cite journal|last=Weinberger|first=Eliot|date=1992|title=The Camera People|journal=Transition|volume=55|issue=55|pages=24–54|doi=10.2307/2934848|jstor=2934848}}</ref>  A voiceover describes the great race between a bird and a snake which was to determine the lives of human beings: Should men shed their skins and live forever like snakes, or die like birds? The bird won: the fate of humans is death. Abruptly the sounds and sights of a funeral envelope the screen.<ref name=":42">{{Cite book|last=Musser|first=Charles|title=Looking with Robert Gardner|publisher=State University of New York Press|year=2016|editor-last=Meyers|editor-first=Rebecca|location=Albany, New York|pages=143–170|chapter=First Encounters: an Essay on Dead Birds|editor-last2=Rothman|editor-first2=William|editor-last3=Warren|editor-first3=Charles}}</ref> Weyak, an adult man, farms, guards the frontier, and creates a complex knotted strap that will be presented to another at a funeral as Laca  (or Laka), his wife, harvests sweet potatoes and goes to make salt with other women of the community.<ref name=":4">{{Cite book|last=Loizos|first=Peter|title=Innovation in Ethnographic Film: From Innocence to Self-Consciousness|url=https://archive.org/details/innovationinethn00loiz|url-access=registration|publisher=University of Chicago Press|year=1993|isbn=0-226-49227-3|location=Chicago|pages=[https://archive.org/details/innovationinethn00loiz/page/144 144]-152}}</ref> The small boy Pua tends pigs, explores nature, and plays with his friends.  Enemy announce their intentions and the men come to the fighting ground, while the women continue to the salt grounds and Pua plays and tends his pigs.  One fighter is wounded, it begins to rain, and the battle ends.<ref name=":4" />  ''Dead Birds'' now focuses on the relationship of the living to the ghosts and the rituals that placate them and keep them away from the village. As a pig ritual is planned and pigs are slaughtered, news comes that Pua's little friend Weyakhe has been killed.<ref name=":4" /> The next sequence details Weyakhe's funeral ceremony.<ref name=":4" />  Laca receives the funeral strap: Weyak does not want to touch it.  He heads to his guard tower.  In the distance, the enemy dance to celebrate this victory over Weyak's group.<ref name=":62"/> The victory does not last long, for Weyak's people kill a man who tried to steal a pig.  Now the victors celebrate with their own dance.  Scenes of the celebration are intercut with those of Weyak completing his weaving.  As dusk closes in the camera and voiceover lingers on the celebration, on birds, and death.<ref name=":5" />

== Production ==
{{stack begin}}
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{{Location map|Indonesia Highland Papua#Indonesia Western New Guinea#Indonesia
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|caption       = Location of the Dani of Wita Waya District in Jayawijaya, Highland Papua, Indonesia
|alt           =
|label         = Wita Waya
|link          = Wita Waya
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|marksize      = 6
|coordinates   = {{coord|4.019|S|138.923|E|display=inline,title}}
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Robert Gardner sought to film the last days of indigenous warfare in western New Guinea and accordingly organized the Harvard-Peabody Expedition (1961–65) which brought together a multidisciplinary team to collect data on various aspects of war and culture in the Baliem Valley of western New Guinea.<ref name="Gardner 1993 82–89">{{Cite journal|last=Gardner|first=Robert|date=1993|title=The Impulse to Preserve|journal=Harvard Review|volume=3|pages=82–89}}</ref><ref name="nyt2011">{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/11/movies/retrospective-of-robert-gardner-ethnographer-at-film-forum.html|title=Bringing Faraway Worlds Closer, And Questioning Western Intrusions|date=November 10, 2011|work=[[The New York Times]]}}</ref> In addition to filmmaker Gardner, team members included [[Jan Broekhuijse]] (anthropologist), [[Karl G. Heider|Karl Heider]] (anthropologist), [[Peter Matthiessen|Peter Matthiesson]]  (naturalist), and [[Michael Rockefeller]]  (sound).<ref name="Gardner 1993 82–89"/><ref name=":0">{{Cite book|last1=Gardner|first1=Robert|title=Gardens of War|last2=Heider|first2=Karl G.|publisher=Random House|others=Margaret Mead (Introduction)|year=1968|location=New York|pages=xiv–xv}}</ref> Gardner carried out the filming from the team's arrival in early 1961 while Rockefeller captured samples of [[Wild track|wild sound]] for later use, as the filming did not use the then-new [[synchronous sound]] technology.  Gardner composed the film narrative and edited the raw footage into the film after his return to the United States in August, 1961.<ref name=":0" />   The sound used in the film was post-synchronized from Rockefeller's samples along with the added [[Voice-over|voiceover]] and composed narrative of the film.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Heider|first=Karl G.|title=Ethnographic Film|url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_0292720254|url-access=registration|publisher=University of Texas Press|year=1976|isbn=0-292-72025-4|location=Austin|page=[https://archive.org/details/isbn_0292720254/page/70 70]}}</ref> In line with similar works of ethnographic film at this time, some of the scenes in the film were composed out of shots filmed at different times.<ref name=":3" />

=== Companion works ===

Research conducted for the film and in conjunction with it resulted in several companion works and related publications by Gardner and members of the Harvard-Peabody Expedition. Robert Gardner and Karl Heider's book ''Gardens of War'' detailed the filmmaking and aspects of Dani culture relating to the film's themes .<ref name=":0" />  A recent work by Gardner and Charles Warren described the making of this film.<ref>{{Cite book|last1=Gardner|first1=Robert|title=Making Dead Birds|last2=Warren|first2=Charles|publisher=Peabody Museum Press|year=2008|location=Cambridge, MA}}</ref> [[Karl G. Heider]]  authored ''The Dani of West Irian: an Ethnographic Companion to the Film Dead Birds'', ethnographic monographs, and film shorts.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Heider|first=Karl G.|title=The Dugum Dani: a Papuan Culture in the Highlands of West New Guinea|publisher=Aldine|year=1970|location=Chicago}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Heider|first=Karl G.|title=The Dani of West Irian: An Ethnographic Companion to the Film Dead Birds|publisher=Warner Modular Publications Inc|year=1972|location=New York}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Heider|first=Karl G.|title=Grand Valley Dani: Peaceful Warriors|publisher=Wadsworth Thomson Learning|year=1997|edition=3rd|location=Belmont, California}}</ref> [[Peter Matthiessen]] separately wrote about the Dugum Dani and Baliem Valley in his book ''Under the Mountain Wall: a Chronicle of Two Seasons in the Stone Age.''<ref>{{Cite book|last=Matthiessen|first=Peter|title=Under the Mountain Wall: a Chronicle of Two Seasons in the Stone Age|url=https://archive.org/details/undermountainwal0000matt|url-access=registration|publisher=Viking Press|year=1962|location=New York}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Zwart|first=F. H. A. G.|date=1964|title=Reviewed Works: Nawok! The New Zealand Expedition to New Guinea's Highest Mountains by PHILIP TEMPLE and Edmund Hillary: Under the Mountain Wall. A Chronicle of Two Seasons in the Stone age by Peter Matthiessen |journal=Journal of the Polynesian Society|volume=73|issue=1|pages=98–99}}</ref>

== Background ==
''Dead Birds'' reflects the concerns of anthropology emergent by the early 1960s relating to the practice of warfare in non-state level societies.<ref name=":22"/><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Otterbein|first=Keith F.|date=2000|title=A History of Research on Warfare in Anthropology|journal=American Anthropologist|volume=101|issue=4|pages=794–805|doi=10.1525/aa.1999.101.4.794|doi-access=free}}</ref>  The film also fits the-then dominant paradigm of [[Structural functionalism|structural-functionalism]] that emphasized demonstrating how diverse characteristics fit into the larger pattern of the culture.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=MacDougall|first=David|date=1978|title=Ethnographic Film: Failure and Promise|journal=Annual Review of Anthropology|volume=7|pages=405–425|doi=10.1146/annurev.an.07.100178.002201}}</ref>  ''Dead Birds'' has been taken to exemplify the approach of anthropological holism as it knits together small and seemingly insignificant moments and actions, with those of great cultural significance.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Mishler|first=Craig|date=1985|title=Narrativity and Metaphor in Ethnographic Film: A Critique of Robert Gardner's Dead Birds|journal=American Anthropologist|volume=87|issue=3|pages=668–672|doi=10.1525/aa.1985.87.3.02a00220|doi-access=free}}</ref>

== Release ==
The film was first shown at an evening meeting of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences held at the Cohen Arts Center at Tufts University, Boston, on Nov. 13, 1963.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Gardner|first=Robert|date=1963|title=The November Meeting|journal=Bulletin of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences|volume=7|issue=1|pages=2–4}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Gardner|first=Robert|date=1963|title=Communication: Dead Birds A Film About the Dani of Western New Guinea|journal=Bulletin of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences|volume=17|issue=2|pages=1–2}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Anonymous|date=1963|title=The 1449th Stated Meeting|journal=Bulletin of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences|volume=17|issue=2|page=1}}</ref>  It was first distributed by Contemporary Films at 267 West 25th Street, New York.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Anonymous|date=1965|title=Audio Visual News|journal=The Clearing House|volume=40|issue=1|pages=63–64}}</ref>

==Reception==
Since the film's release, some reviewers have praised filmmaker Gardner's presentation as poetic and cinematographic, while others have criticized it as lacking a clear scientific and ethnographic focus.<ref name=":14"/><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Jarvie|first=I. C.|date=1983|title=The Problem of the Ethnographic Real [and comments and reply]|journal=Current Anthropology|volume=24|issue=3|pages=313–325|doi=10.1086/203000|s2cid=146576560}}</ref> Reviewers have frequently remarked on its evocation of a Dani fable and its supporting shots of birds.<ref name=":7" />   The most-noted visual is the long [[take]] of a bird soaring over the Baliem Valley that is the film's [[establishing shot]].<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Watson|first=James B.|date=1965|title=Reviewed Works: Dead Birds by Robert Gardner|journal=American Anthropologist|volume=67|issue=5|pages=1357–1359|doi=10.1525/aa.1965.67.5.02a00680|doi-access=free}}</ref>  Reviewers point out that the film foregrounds Dugum Dani understandings of the world.<ref>{{Cite book|last=MacDougall|first=David|title=Fields of Vision: Essays in Film Studies, Visual Anthropology, and Photography|url=https://archive.org/details/fieldsofvisiones00lesl|url-access=registration|publisher=University of California Press|year=1995|isbn=0-520-08524-8|editor-last=Devereaux|editor-first=Leslie|location=Berkeley, California|pages=[https://archive.org/details/fieldsofvisiones00lesl/page/234 234]–237|chapter=The Subjective Voice in Ethnographic Film|editor-last2=Hillman|editor-first2=Roger}}</ref> Others complained that the film gave short shrift to data on the culture such as the kinship system and food production.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Callenbach|first=Ernest|date=1966|title=Reviewed Works: Dead Birds by Robert Gardner|journal=Film Quarterly|volume=18|issue=3|pages=56–58|doi=10.2307/1210256|jstor=1210256}}</ref> Though stylistically impressive, ''Dead Birds'' has been criticized with respect to its authenticity. The characters who speak in the film are never subtitled, and even then the voice itself is not always what it seems. What the audience perceives as Weyak's voice is actually a post-filming dub of [[Karl G. Heider]] speaking Dani. Gardner himself did not speak Dani, and so all his interpretations of events are second-hand. The battle sequences are made up of many shots taken during different battles and stitched together to give the appearance of temporal unity. The apparent continuity stems from the post-synchronized sound, and in fact all the sound in the film is post-synched. Heider, himself, admits in his book ''Ethnographic Film'', that some of the battle films were edited out of sequence, intercut with a scene of the women at the salt pool, which was filmed at a different time than the battle sequences.<ref name=":3">Heider, Karl. ''Ethnographic Film''. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1978.</ref>

==See also==
{{portal|New Guinea}}
* [[List of American films of 1963]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Bibliography==
* Ruby, Jay. ''Picturing Culture: Explorations of Film and Anthropology.'' Chicago: U. of Chicago Press, 2000.
* Heider, Karl. ''Ethnographic Film.'' Austin: University of Texas Press, 1978.
* Kirsch, Stuart. "Ethnographic Representation and the Politics of Violence in West Papua". ''Critique of Anthropology'' 30(1):3–22, 2010.

==External links==
* {{IMDb title|0059091|Dead Birds }}
* ''Dead Birds'' essay by Daniel Eagan in America's Film Legacy: The Authoritative Guide to the Landmark Movies in the National Film Registry, A&C Black, 2010 {{ISBN|0826429777}}, pp. 613–614 [https://books.google.com/books?id=deq3xI8OmCkC]

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dead Birds (1963 Film)}}
[[Category:1963 films]]
[[Category:United States National Film Registry films]]
[[Category:Anthropology documentary films]]
[[Category:Ethnofiction films]]
[[Category:1963 documentary films]]
[[Category:Works about Western New Guinea]]
[[Category:American docufiction films]]
[[Category:1960s English-language films]]
[[Category:1960s American films]]
[[Category:Documentary films about Indigenous people in Indonesia]]