Body Snatchers (1993)

nBody Snatchers (1993)

nDirector:nAbel Ferrara

nCast: Meg Tilly, R. Lee Ernie, Forest Whitaker, GabriellenAnwar, Christine Elise, Terry Kinney, Reilly Murphy, Billy Wirth

nOne thing I find interesting about these Body Snatchernmovies is that they are not clones of each other, they are all differentnsomehow, which kind of goes in line with the main characters in these films whonare always fighting to retain what makes them different, what makes the unique.nYeah, sure all four films are about the fear of losing our individuality, butnat the same time they all have little things that make them just a littlendifferent. For example, while in Phillip Kaufman’s Invasion of the BodySnatchers (1978) we follow a Health Department official as he uncovers thenhorrors of the invasion, on this one we follow a teenage girl who’s moving to anmilitary base with her family, because her dad is going to investigate anchemical spill.

nThe fact that this film takes place in an American militarynbase is what sets this version apart from all others because for example, then1956 version served as an allegory for America’s fear of communism, essentiallynmaking it a film about how we needed to fear the Russians because they werengoing to turn us all into communist. But on this ‘93 version, it’s the Americannmilitary who are the bad guys; I thought it was interesting how the filmmakersnswitched things around like that. I guess they figured that times had changednand that fear of communism was no longer a relevant theme. They did a similarnthing in the ’78 version which eliminated the political allegories all together.nThat one was just about the fear of losing our humanity, which is probably whynI like it so much, it just concentrates on pure fear, pure paranoia and becausenof that, it’s a very effective horror film.

nAbel Ferrara is the director behind this remake, and well,nMr. Ferrara isn’t exactly known for making commercial horror sci-fi hybrids. Innfact, Abel Ferrara is better known for making ultra realistic films aboutncorrupt cops and mafia warlords. I speak of course of films like the amazing doublenwhammy: The Bad Lieutenant (1992) and King of New York (1990), two films Inhighly recommend you guys watch, you won’t soon forget them. To some, it might seem strange to see Ferrarandirecting a science fiction/horror film, but we can’t forget that, Ferrara’sncareer actually started with a no-budget, ultra gritty slasher film known as The Driller Killer (1979); a filmnabout an artist who is so poor and flat out frustrated with his life, that henstarts killing people with his power drill! So anyhow, it’s cool seeing Ferraranreturning to his horror roots. Does he succeed?

nI’d say he did because the film has some genuinely chillingnmoments, it’s not a perfect film, but it’s not a disaster. What I enjoy aboutnthese Body Snatchers films is that they are all about people being chastisednfor being different, for thinking differently and so there’s this scene where anlittle kid is in school painting a picture with all his little student friends,nproblem is that when the teacher asks everyone to show what they’ve drawn, allndrawings are the same, except for the one done by the little human kid. There’snanother scene where someone who’s been turned into an alien tells her husbandn“Where are you going to run? Where are you going to hide? There’s no one likenyou left” A chilling scene delivered with great gusto. The one problem is that thenfilm takes a while to really take off. Before the aliens start showing up,nthere’s a lot of exposition and unfortunately not a whole lot of tension. Whichnis something I really liked about the 1978 version, there’s this feeling ofnunease from the very first moments. On this one, I think they needed to augmentnthe paranoia earlier on, in my opinion they waited too long to turn up thenheat. Actually, I really didn’t get that feeling of paranoia I got from the ’78nversion, this one is just “let’s run from the monsters” type of film.

nAnother downside tonthis film is the banality of the main characters, who we don’t really get tonknow. In Phillip Kaufman’s ’78 version of Body Snatchers you get to know thenmain characters because you spend some time with them. There’s this scene wherenwe see Donald Sutherland and Brooke Adams having dinner together, being silly,nwe get to see their human side. In fact, it’s one of the things I remember thenmost about that ’78 version, the special effort that was made to make the humanncharacters really human. Not so much on this one because we’re never reallyngiven a chance to connect with them, we’re supposed to be scared that they willnturned into alien drones, but how can we when we don’t get to see their humannside in the first place? In Body Snatchers, what freaks us out are the aliens,nbut we don’t really fear for the protagonists. Some performances do stand outnthough, Meg Tilly does an amazing job with some of her scenes, in fact, she hasnthe most chilling scene in the whole film. Forest Whitaker has some intensenscene as well, unfortunately the rest of the cast weren’t compelling enough. Thisnis especially the case with Gabrielle Anwar, the actress playing the teenager,nshe needed to be developed and portrayed much better; more so when we take innconsideration that she is carrying the entire film on her shoulders.

nSo what we have here is a good, but not excellent remake.nThankfully, the good outweigh the bad. For example, when Ferrara’s BodynSnatchers finally takes off, and the aliens start shrieking and pointing at thenhumans, things get intense and freaky. I have to admit when the first alien shriekednit got to me. The last half of the film is solid in my book, the ending is kindnof overtly simple and abrupt. It’s explosive, but rushed. I was not aware of it, but Stuart Gordon thendirector behind Re-Animator (1985) and From Beyond (1986) partially wrote thenscript, so it’s cool having a great horror director doing scripting duties,nit’s also great to have a distinguished director like Ferrara behind thencameras. I only wish they’d made more ofnan effort to make the humans more human, as it is, the human characters on thisnfilm feel like they’ve been cloned before the aliens even laid a singlententacle on them.

nRating: 3 out of 5