1993's
Body Snatchers, while not as entertaining as 1956's
Invasion of the Body Snatchers, or as paranoiac as the 1978 remake - is still heads and shoulders above the 2007 version (
Invasion).
Director
Abel Ferrara took this familiar tale of seed pods from space and placed the action at a military base that seems to be already infected by the nefarious cosmic sprouts well before our main characters arrive.
Once the dysfunctional family arrive (an EPA doc played by
Terry Kinney, his wife played by
Meg Tilly and their kids played by
Gabrielle Anwar and
Reilly Murphy) at the housing center on the base, it's already apparent that something creepy is afoot. Soldiers stare dull eyed at each other, expressionless neighbors wake at dawn to walk small hefty bags filled with Christ-knows-what out to trash trucks, pre-school children finger-paint the same bland
Jackson Pollock-like pictures, the local bar is mostly empty ... the first to notice this is the youngest son who runs away from his kindergarten claiming that his classroom is full of "bad people".
It does not take very long for the obnoxious teen daughter (Anwar) to figure out things are wacky, especially when she dozes off in the bathtub and wakes up to find a partially formed double of her crashing in through the ceiling. Meanwhile, Mom (who has already morphed) is watching as her husband undergoes his transformation.
At this point, The Body Snatchers really serves up the gross out goods. We get to see how the pods suck the life out of the living via worm-like roots that slip into the body of their host, and we also get a glimpse of the half formed humanoids (look out for that one hiding under the bed!) - but what really makes this moment of the film so tremendous is when Meg Tilly's character explains to her husband that he's toast: Tilly stares blankly at her now hysterical mate who is trying to gather his family and leave the military base and says to him, rather calmly, "
Where you gonna go, where you gonna run, where you gonna hide? Nowhere... 'cause there's no one like you left." No doubt, this is one of the creepiest bits of dialouge you might ever hear. Furthermore, when the family does take off, Tilly's pod-mom freaks out and let's out with a banshee howl to warn the others that daddy and the kids are still human!
Unfortunately, after this point, the films sort of falls apart - a hasty retreat from the base ensues, bombs drop and a, seemingly, last minute ending is tacked on. That said, this version of
Jack Finney's classic science fiction story is well worth a viewing if for nothing more than the excellent special effects, and Meg Tilly's spellbinding 11th hour performance.
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