Invasion (2007) starring Nicole Kidman, Daniel Craig, Jeffrey Wright, and directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel with James McTeigue (uncredited additional scenes).
©Warner Bros.
Rated: PG-13
Stars: Nicole Kidman, Daniel Craig, Jeremy Northam, Jackson Bond, Jeffrey Wright
Writer: David Kajganich, based on the novel The Body Snatchers by Jack Finney
Director: Oliver Hirschbiegel
Distributor: Warner Bros.
Invasion
By: themovielordDate: Friday, December 21, 2007
With this being the third remake of ‘Invasion of the Body Snatchers’ (1956) the plot is pretty standard at this point. Aliens arrive on Earth and take over our bodies creating a peaceful complacent society with no free will or thought. So what in 2007 could make this story anymore interesting or different?
The story still has its punch. It starts small with strange occurrences here and there. First the space shuttle crashes and spreads debris across the country. Then little things happen to families. What is different in 2007 is the spread of news and its cover up. Even in ‘Body Snatchers’ (1993) there wasn’t the news coverage there is today. This in many ways made the story more real and brought about many things that showed the Aliens were taking over on a global scale. Using it as a plague to get inoculated, actually the way to get infected, brought the real world fear of the bird flu and West Nile immediately to mind.
What was tiresome was having the divorced parent’s alienation of one another to start the fear of where is my son? After this ran its course, the film quickly got into the silent invasion plot, which was needed because Mom and Dad not getting along is cliché’ now. One other thing that was completely cliché’ was the big debate about free will and taking a pill to make your troubles go away. It brought up interesting questions, which of course were answered in the film. Why this was cliché’ is because they were trying to dumb down the movie for the audience, however it made it dull and confusing with its big words and hefty monologues. A movie like “Invasion” or its predecessors is written to make you think about free will and choices. Not have it spelled out for you.
Nicole Kidman is clearly making the best of this tired story. She elevates the script with her believability and does so much with a smile, that it actually shames any actress who thinks they could hold a candle to her. Daniel Craig is alright, but if he wasn’t Bond (though cast for Bond while shooting) he’d just be another British actor playing a doctor in this film. Veronica Cartwright who was in the ‘Invasion of the Body Snatchers’ (1978) adds to the cast in a small role but one that is the tip of the iceberg for the invasion. She gives us the cliché’ of battered wife with now nice guy husband. When will the aliens learn to keep acting the same (at least for a while)? Her fear is real and that sells it to the viewer.
The editing with its flashbacks and flash forwards really gave this film an interesting pace and feel. Many times there are chase scenes or running scenes inter-cut with emotional or tense moments as to understand what the characters are feeling but propel the story further. An interesting technique however was it intended by the original director, Oliver Hirschbiegel, or something Joel Silver and the Wachowski Brothers brought to the film to “save it”.
For all it’s cliché’ “Invasion” was still fun. It is a survival movie and one the audience immediately see themselves in. With that “Invasion”, like all the other ‘Invasion of the Body Snatchers’ movies bring about two questions. The first “Is free will worth the price of peace?” and the second question is, “How far can the human spirit be pushed when it comes to its very own survival?” Personally I found myself rooting for Kidman and trying to figure out how it was all going to end. Who would after all be the last to become one of them?
Click here to read the staff review by Mania.
