Jamaica Inn (film) far-removed from the darker characters and sinister inn and coastline depicted in the book. Today it is considered one of Hitchcock's worst films. Hitchcock himself was disgusted with the film even before it was finished and stated that it was a "completely absurd" idea. However, the film still garnered a large profit (US$3.7 million, a huge success at the time) at the box office. Daphne du Maurier was also not pleased with the finished production and for a while she considered withholding the film rights to "Rebecca". In 1978, film critic Michael Medved gave "Jamaica Inn" a place in his
Sooty shearwater birds; in 2009 the number was estimated to be closer to 40 per cage. On August 18, 1961, the "Santa Cruz Sentinel" reported that thousands of crazed sooty shearwaters were sighted on the shores of North Monterey Bay in California, regurgitating anchovies, flying into objects, and dying on the streets. The incident sparked the interest of local resident Alfred Hitchcock, along with a story about spooky bird behavior by British writer Daphne du Maurier, helping to inspire Hitchcock's 1963 thriller "The Birds", a cautionary tale of nature revolting against man. The film is now ranked among the American Film Institute's