a wonderfully made documentary! the story line is consistent and keeps you glued for the next situation or event in the parrots and bittners involvement with them and their daily life.you will feel very sorry for some of the parrots. and feel glad that bittner is there to care for them. but in the end - nature wins.my only problem with this docu was the taking of "mingus" and some other parrots (which were caged) to a parrot rescue center. it is never explained why bittner couldn't keep the indoor caged parrots when he moved. he found a place to live! and he loved "mingus". this decision is never made clear.otherwise i would suggest this movie to anyone interested in urban wild life and human interaction with them!

The buzz about "Wild Parrots" is that it is a heartwarming portrait of a gentle man's bittersweet love affair with beautiful parrots.Well, okay, if that's the movie you saw, great.The "Wild Parrots" I saw was disappointing.The least I expect from any filmmaker is honesty. If you use your camera to ferret out truths that most of us miss, and present those truths articulately and in an interesting way to others, you work deserves a showing, no matter its topic. I love birds and haven't much interest in sports and would rather watch an insightful sports documentary than a movie about birds that plays it safe and fudges its story."Wild Parrots" follows forty something San Franciscan Mark Bittner's relationship with a flock of feral parrots that live on Telegraph Hill in San Francisco. Bittner spends much of his time hand feeding the birds and observing their behavior. Bittner, who is of sound mind and body but declines to work, lives rent-free in a cottage owned by people who apparently do work.The documentary's drama comes when the cottage owners decide that they must renovate the cottage. Given how extensively it needs to be renovated, they ask Bittner to leave.Bittner is shown weeping on camera. He gives away Mingus, a parrot he had living in the cottage with him. He says goodbye to Conner, a lone member of a species that is different from the rest of the flock. Conner had never been able to find a mate (a hard thing for a parrot, as they are very social) and Bittner had performed some mate-like functions for Conner, for example grooming him.Mingus is sent to live in a facility for abandoned parrots, and lonely Conner, after appearing to mourn Bittner's departure, dies tragically.The movie wants us to believe that Bittner is being victimized by the couple who asked him to leave their cottage, where he had lived for years without paying any rent. The movie wants us to believe that Mingus and Conner's sad fate is all the fault of the evil landlords.Oh, baloney.Bittner makes it clear that he has long refused to work for a living, preferring what he calls a more "spiritual" and "pure" lifestyle. Jesus was a carpenter . . . but that kind of labor is not good enough for Mark Bittner.Bittner could have gotten a job, enabled himself to pay rent, moved to a new apartment, and taken Mingus with him. After Bittner was evicted, he was taken in by friends in the East Bay. He was a short public transportation ride away from the parrot flock. He could have easily continued to visit the wild parrots; Conner did not have to mourn him.I've lived in the Bay Area. I met many who didn't work, and who didn't pay rent. These folks often announced themselves as above such pedestrian concerns as, oh, paying money for the food they ate, or contributing to society through labor. These folks often sponged off of their parents and friends. They often disappointed their loved ones and children. Like Bittner, they always had quotes from Zen scriptures at the ready to make themselves sound deep.Maybe there is a good reason why Bittner could not work, or live up to his commitments even to a flock of birds. The film never explores that question, though. It accepts, without any curiosity, Bittner's self description as a man too spiritual to work. The filmmaker became lovers with Bittner. Even so, women have been able, in the past, to explore the truths, both the benign truths and the hard truths, of their lovers' lives. That's what art is for, even art about parrots.The film doesn't even look very hard at the parrots it captures in its frame. There are very difficult to watch scenes of parrots attacking an injured flock member. No theory is offered as to why this happens.Any film featuring footage of parrots, other birds, and the sun on San Francisco Bay can't be all bad; "Wild Parrots" is beautiful. I just wish "Wild Parrots" had had a little bit more courage, a tad more curiosity, and some honesty. If the film had been more probing, and more honest, about both Bittner and the parrots, I'm sure I would have liked him, the birds, and the film much more.

Before writing this, I took a quick skim over the other comments on this film. I had to smile when I saw there were no comments degrading the movie as much as I might have expected.'Parrots' opens with a skeptic inquiring about Bittner's relationship with the birds. If he feeds them, takes care of them when they're sick, and plays with them, what makes them wild, and not simply his pet flock? This opening scene aptly demonstrates most the preconceived notions one might have coming into the movie.However, Bittner proves to be an articulate, intelligent man, who can quietly laugh and compare himself to 'the crazy pigeon lady'. He cares deeply about these parrots, and we do too. As we meet them, Bittner sheds a bit of his own personal thoughts about the birds. He explores the human characteristics of these parrots, their cliques and love triangles, and even if we might not be enough of a bird expert to tell one red headed bird from the other, we love them all anyways.Judy Irving proves to be incredibly skilled as director, bringing us not just the quirkiness of the parrots and their pet human, but also shows the realities of the birds as wild animals. They are in danger of hawks, even are threatened by activist intervention.As far as documentaries go, 'Wild Parrots' should be remembered. No matter how skeptical or weird you think a person has to be in order to grow so attached to wild birds, this film does what all great films do; it gives you the will and the desire to care.

This documentary speaks volumes to those with a little bit of an open mind. You don't have to be a spiritual naturalist to accept some of the ideas Irving makes a valiant effort at getting across. There is nothing brutal or graphic about this G-rated movie, it's a family-oriented documentary about birds, but the storytelling is direct and often very emotional. There is one story told by the "hero" Bittner near the end that is one of the most emotional and effective stories about the human connection with animals I have ever heard. And this film works well as a collection of individual stories because there are so many birds. The true value in this film is that Bittner is not some expert on human/bird relations giving us lessons; he too makes mistakes he regrets and this film does the right thing in documenting what he did right and what he thought he should have done better with these wild birds. Recommended highly for anyone who respects animals in any way, plain and simple!