THE INVASION
No
doubt The Invasion, the latest re-imagining
of the classic ‘body Snatchers’
tale, will see many movie analysts looking for links between its story line and
the current political climate, a fact that producer Joel Silver (The Matrix) is
more than aware of. “It still has political overtones, but I think it’s about
how an insidious invasion like this could happen, how without us realizing it
or being aware of it, it could just creep in and take over, “he comments. “That
was the most effective part of the material. David Kajganich wrote an
original screenplay that really is fresh and takes the idea in a different
light, and we did good service to that.”
The Invasion, which stars Daniel
Craig and Nicole Kidman, updates, but doesn’t stray too far from, the source
material, despite reports to the contrary. The film begins with a tragic space
shuttle crash, the craft’s hull unbeknownst to the people of Earth,
carrying an alien spore brought back from its voyage into Space. As the
population become exposed to this extra-terrestrial
menace they begin to change in terrifying ways. The first to notice the bizarre
epidemic is Washington DC psychiatrist Carol Bennell (Kidman) and her colleague
Ben Driscoll (Craig) who comes to realize that the plague is other-worldly. They’re also the first to
cotton on to the fact that people are succumbing to the infection whilst a
sleep, waking as utterly emotionless drones known as ‘Snatchers’, who only exist to contaminate others and take control.
Directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel,
most famous for helming the exceptional German-language
film Downfall, an account of the last days of Adolf Hitler, The Invasion will
no doubt have a grittier edge and more thoughtful plot than the average Sci Fi
blockbuster. “Its exciting to find that we’re going through a time where
political cinema is entertaining,” remarks star Daniel Craig, in reference to
the fact that the first people to become mindless Snatchers in the film are
those in seats of political power in Washington. “You can entertain people and
make them think, and it really boils down to that.”
Speaking from the location shoot in
downtown Baltimore, the city chosen to stand in for the nation’s capital,
Hirschbiegel describes the night’s filming which revolves around a scene where
Ben and Carol are trying to rescue Oliver from the Snatchers. “They stole a
police car, but they were detected and are now being followed,” he says from
the freezing cold makeshift set. “And the strange thing is that the cops don’t
do anything. They seem to push them in a certain direction. They’ve pushed
them towards the centre where they
detain all the people that haven’t changed. Ben comes up with this plan to
really take a fast turn into an alley and get Carol out of the car, then be the
hero and distract the crowd so that she can get away.”
