So a few weeks ago for my Sunday Night Movie I watched Invasion Of The Body Snatchers. In my comments I mentioned that there had been three remakes of the classic SF film, one in 1979, one in the 90s and the most recent in 2007, this film The Invasion with Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig. I remember when this film was released in the theaters and having heard it was yet another remake I skipped seeing it. (While I liked the 1979 version, 1993s The Body Snatchers was so awful I had no desire to see this material abused once again.)
However, having watched the original I became curious about this remake and with Netflix to aid me, I had a blu-ray sent to my home. Now, I am sorry I missed this fin film in the theaters.
This is most certainly a remake, no doubt about that. It is not a whole cloth reinvention, nor it is not a cookie-cutter slap-dash copy of the original, and because of that it succeeds. Part of the nature of these alien invaders has been changed, no longer are there large seed-pods from which perfect copies emerge, but what has replaced that is a much more credible premise, infection. Alien spores that invade your body, and activated by R.E.M. sleep, transform you into the classical pod person. (Now you just let them have the whole alien life form infecting a species from an entirely different evolutionary path, but once you do the rest follows logically and credibly. There is a fungus I think that infects acts and changes their behavior into something beneficial for the fungus and fatal for the ants.)
The original film took place in a small California town, something easily containable, the 1979 remake was set in San Francisco, and this one the infection breaks out across a swath stretching from Dallas to Washington D.C. a vast infected area. This film also go further along and gives us a peek as what happens one the pod-people no longer need to maintain their masquerade. At this juncture it felt almost like a zombie film, but for me much more frightening.
The actors all turn in wonderful performance, including one child actor who goes far beyond creepy.
The only downside to this movie, was a critical mis-step in my opinion by the filmmakers in the opening. The film starts with a shuttle breaking up while reentering the atmosphere. That alone in 2007 would be enough to make some people uncomfortable, just 4 years after the Columbia tragedy. Including actual footage of Columbia breaking up for entertainment purposes is simply wrong, cheap, and tawdry.
That aside I really enjoyed the film and look forward to one day adding it to my collection.
