Philip Kaufman is 89 years old today. He was born on 23 October 1936.
I wouldn’t call Kaufman a psychotronic filmmaker. He certainly made a number of genre films. But mostly, he was just a very good director. He made whatever films he could.
But there is one major exception: Invasion of the Body Snatchers. The first Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) is a classic. But I do have some minor criticisms of it. Too much of it takes place in suburban homes — typical of 1950s B movies. But this is minor. The film moves along quickly and we never stay anywhere too long.
The frame story is the biggest problem, as pretty much everyone acknowledges. (People hated it at the time!) That’s 75 seconds at the beginning and just under two minutes at the end. It takes a terrifying story and reframes it as a story about American “can do” pluckiness.
The worst thing about this is that it diminishes the remake. If the film had ended where it should, we would find Kevin McCarthy ranting on the highway as cars pass him by. And that sets up the best scene in the remake where McCarthy (22 years older) shouts at our 1978 heroes, “They’re coming!”
And then, Kaufman kills him — instantly. Because this version ain’t playing pattycake!
None of this is to say that the remake is perfect. I think the late second act drags a big. The film should probably be about 10 minutes shorter. But coming from me — who thinks most films should be a half-hour shorter — that isn’t a great criticism.
I’m not sure that the 1978 version of the film had that much bigger a budget than the 1956 version did. But it feels so much bigger. Part of it is that they set it in San Francisco. So even the home interiors are more interesting. Plus the pods being shipped overseas is just wonderful and horific. Of course, credit for this should go to producer Robert H Solo.
But Philip Kaufman should get credit for what is best in this film, which is its 1970s-era paranoia. Just as we can say that the original was about the Cold War, this version is about Richard Nixon and Watergate.
Plus, there’s Leonard Nimoy, who was always best as a villain — in particular, this kind of villain!
As time has gone on, I find it hard to say why one film works and another doesn’t. And sure, I can justify any film’s brilliance. But the bottom line is that this film does work. And it is still fun to watch today.
Image cropped from Philip Kaufman by Gorup de Besanez under CC BY-SA 3.0.
Body Snatchers is this week’s Wonkette Movie Night; I’m excited to see it after watching the original. I don’t know how you could top the phone scene… with McCarthy getting told by a nonplussed telephone operator that “the lines you requested are unavailable at this time.” When he realizes the world is totally and utterly fuuuuqued… It’s great “paranoid thriller” stuff, and I don’t think anybody had ever done it before. Maybe Orwell — when the nice guy in “1984” turns out to have been planning to get you, all along.
Incidentally, when I was looking into the original, I found critics saying it’s a “the Commies are coming” movie, and others saying it’s a “McCarthyism is spreading” movie. (Joseph, not Kevin.)
The best I could tell, it was just book writer Jack Finney and director Don Siegel doing a “spooky things are spooky” story. If anything, it’s Siegel hating on studio execs. More than once, he referred to studio execs as the real “pod people”! No wonder they forced him to add the stupid framing stuff!
I’m curious to see if the Kaufman version fixes the biggest plot hole from the original. The pod people grow, and then they just… astral project their consciousness into your body when you fall asleep? Then why grow the copy body to begin with, if it’s not going to be used? Also, as a backyard gardener… how are the pods growing? In basements? I mean, mold grows fine in basements, but any plant producing edible fruit larger than mold spores requires sunlight, soil, water. But, you know… it’s aliens. They’ve just got alien tech plant powers. Move along, nothing to see here, accept it.
And I do! It’s a spooky-a** movie, and I loved it! How many movies come up with one idea as good as “everyone you trust, who’s telling you not to worry, is actually gonna murder you”? “Gaslight” did, but that was ONE bad guy. In “Body Snatchers,” it’s ALL OF THEM. I don’t remember the Kaufman version much, but I remember thinking “oh, no — it’s even Spock!”
Kaufman was a really good director. And so was Siegel. Yeah, he did “Dirty Harry,” but some people lean hard right as they age, that happens, what can ya do.
The remake does deal with the plant issue. I think they do a great job of it. Also, be sure to watch the very beginning where Patient Zero is Robert Duvall (as a priest)! Kaufman was a great director. And if you can’t do horror all the time, I accept doing all kinds of things really well.
As for Siegel, I think he was arguably better than Kaufman. Let me address Dirty Harry because I’ve researched this. He didn’t see it as reactionary. And he was bothered that others thought it was. I got the impression that he was just trying to make a good film but that he realized (once it was pointed out) that it was reactionary. But he couldn’t face it. The follow-up, Magnum Force, tries to deal with this. And I find that fascinating because reactionary John Milius wrote it.
Interesting! But that doesn’t surprise me. Most film directors — even good ones — aren’t, as a rule, very thoughtful about the implications of the movies they’re making. It’s how Coppola could justify giving millions to Ferdinand Marcos and taking advantage of cheap labor on Apocalypse; when he said “my movie isn’t about Vietnam, it IS Vietnam,” he was more right than he realized!
And when they ARE trying to make Deep Statements, they’re usually pretty shallow ones. That’s why there’s something be said for the in-your-face approach of Sam Fuller; he was content with approaching a subject like a reporter covering the crime beat (which he’d done); he gets right to the point and doesn’t bother with “but what does it all Mean?” There’s no phony objectivity; he’s just Pissed Off at stuff (and usually the right stuff, although I just mentioned a Kaufman title!)
I liked Kaufman’s “The White Dawn,” where American sailors are stranded and half-accepted into an Inuit tribe; it’s respectful of the Inuits without making them out to be noble savages. They’re less bigoted than most Americans of the time, but they’re not perfect, either. Unfortunately the movie has Warren Oates in it, which never helps, but it’s still quite well done.
You are singing my tune with Fuller. What I love about him is that he was my definition of a “real” man. Real men should, above all else, care about protecting the vulnerable. That’s why I think all these bro-culture types today are just cosplaying. They get the attitude but not the substance.
I do, however, understand what it’s like to write a story that you like. And then to realize that it has very dark subtext that you don’t believe. Maybe if I were a better writer, I wouldn’t notice this kind of thing. But in my “Donna Q” screenplay, I made changes for that reason. The problem is that dramatic structure is easiest if you write fascist stories. Liberalism is all about context and nuance. And that’s hard to make work in fiction. But it isn’t the only issue I struggle with. The biggest is making collective action dramatic. I think John Sayles does this brilliantly in Matewan. But it’s the exception.
PS: Don Siegel’s birthday is in 2 days. So this is a great week to watch either of the Invasion films! Good on Wonkette!