MONKEY REVIEW: The Invasion

“My husband isn’t my husband anymore…”

The Invasion, starring Nicole Kidman, Daniel Craig and Jeffrey Wright, is the fourth version of Jack Finney’s book The Body Snatchers, and despite the negative buzz that has surrounded it, it’s not nearly as bad as most audiences have been led to believe. The basic story is the same: Aliens invade Earth and begin taking over human bodies via a virus that transforms its victims when they go to sleep. One of the new wrinkles in this version is how the aliens transmit the virus, which is gross, but certainly efficient. The first half an hour is the best part of the movie, fast moving, increasingly creepy and often quite scary. As with other versions, it’s loaded with political and social commentary, and effectively preys on anxieties about not only viruses, but the vaccines meant to “cure” them. At the midpoint, however, you suddenly get the feeling that the movie’s just skipped a reel, as suddenly people not only know what’s happening, but they know the characteristics of the aliens. “You’re sweating,” someone tells Kidman at one point. “They don’t do that.” What? How does he know that? Where it really goes wrong is the last ten minutes or so, with a resolution so accelerated it’s almost comical. That part of the film was apparently directed by someone other than the original director, Oliver Hirschbiegel, who, one is to assume, had a somewhat more subtle conclusion in mind, one with less screeching tires, fire and crashes. That the reshoots cost an extra $17 million is astonishing considering how small a return all that money produced. Nevertheless, the ending isn’t quite enough to ruin everything that’s gone before. The Invasion ends up being a solid, creepy, very watchable thriller that could’ve been a lot more.

MONKEY RATING: TWO MONKEYS

(For a brief explanation of the Monkey Review rating system, click here.)