October 16th

Body Snatchers (1993) directed by Abel Ferrara

Unlike its two predecessors, this one has little to say. Given that the film is set at a military base, I suppose it's trying to comment on the rigid structure of the military and how recruits are broken down in basic training in order to make them more efficient at thoughtlessly following orders. Sorry, that's not something that particularly worries me, much less frightens me. The military works pretty well that way.

But, it's hard to tell if this movie is trying to do much of anything. At a scant 83 minutes, everything is rushed. The movie doesn't care to spend any time having the main character Marti slowly grow paranoid about the weird behavior of the people around her. Instead, it is far more interesting in just hitting the cool beats from the infinitely superior '78 version. We get pods that spew fluid from one end and make sounds like a fetal heartbeat. We get white tendrils reaching out for people. We get people dissolving when the duplication has finished and the pod person dumping the remains in garbage trucks. Most of all, we get pod people screaming and pointing. There is lots and lots of screaming and pointing in this movie. I get it. I liked the ending of the '78 version, too. But, c'mon, man.