Birdemic 3: Sea Eagle – Fantastic Fest Review

11th October 2022

Fantastic Fest 2022: My Experience with ‘Birdemic 3: Sea Eagle’

A film reviewer has the responsibility of watching and criticising different types of films, through different genres and quality. When writing a review, it can sometimes be easy to type out thoughts and feelings towards the media and sometimes it can be a struggle.

This is one of those times; reviewing ‘Birdemic 3: Sea Eagle’ is going to be one of the most challenging articles I will probably ever write.

‘Birdemic 3: Sea Eagle’ is the third film in the extremely low budget ‘Birdemic’ franchise. The film follows Evan and Kim who quickly develop a relationship in their small beach town. But, as the title suggests, the town is soon under attack from rabid eagles.

The first film is infamous for extremely cheap visual effects and bad acting and cinematography, and the third film continues to implement these aspects. And, while the first film was enjoyable due to its poor quality, ‘Birdemic 3: Sea Eagle’ is just dull.

A lot of technical mistakes are expected by now: some shots will suddenly switch to a different type of lighting despite being in the same location, some dialogue suddenly changes volume drastically without warning and there’s even a moment where a character is supposed to be talking yet their mouth isn’t moving. But what’s been added are long lingering shots, that are in desperate need of a re-edit. As proof of this, the film contains a 6-minute opening credit sequence, which then transitions to a silent scene of the main character, Evan, walking down the beach before transitioning to him watching TV. And even this scene goes on for too long, with a news segment that treats the audience with no respect for their intelligence at all.

This theme of treating the audience poorly doesn’t end at that scene; it continues throughout the entire film. A 10-minute scene early on in the film occurs where Kim is asking Evan about his job, and it is painful to listen to; it’s as if she’s asking Google various questions. But ‘Birdemic 3’ also tries to carry a message about Climate Change, fires affecting America and how we can help save our planet. This is a very important and relevant message as it continues to affect the world, but the writing is so poor and unsubtle that it appears disrespectful to the issue. If the script had a different writer, then ‘Birdemic 3’ could’ve easily have worked with this message and the consequences that it shows. But this is ‘Birdemic’ and good writing doesn’t exist in this world.

If there were anything positive to say about ‘Birdemic 3: Sea Eagle’, it’s that the Van-Gogh style poster is actually lovely, and some of the beach shots look great, but their appearances are rare and does not make for a good 80-minute film.

After enjoying the first film, ‘Birdemic 3: Sea Eagle’ is just as awful as the previous films and additionally dull. The poor quality in writing, editing, acting and effects are once again here but the film takes its time in developing a relationship between the two characters that I forgot this was supposed to be about bird attacks. Plus, the creatures didn’t show until the 60-minute mark, looking like something out of a Bugs Bunny cartoon.

‘Birdemic 3: Sea Eagle’ is an hour of long lingering scenes where nothing happens, a 6-minute opening credit scene and 15 minutes of crazy birds. It almost begs the question: by the third film, was the writer/director making a bad film on purpose after the cult following of the first entry?

I expected a bad film, but not something to fall asleep to. But, if you really want to watch this, there’s a great game to play alongside it: take a drink every time the word ‘wildfire’ is spoken.

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