"Invasion Of The Body Snatchers" (1978)

Starring: Donald Sutherland, Brooke Adams, Jeff Goldblum, Veronica Cartwright, Leonard Nimoy

First, the Lowdown: The city of San Francisco is invaded by an insidious alien metaphor. (Like you can tell.)

On a barren planet millions of light years away, dormant puddles of protozoan life drift into the vast ether of space only to eventually land in San Francisco. They take root as tiny parasitic plants, and that’s when the fun begins.

Elizabeth Driscoll is a lab technician with the San Francisco Department of Health, and an avid gardener. While walking home, she sees one of the parasitic buds and takes it home to examine at home. There she tries to enlighten her boyfriend, Geoffrey, but isn’t successful because he’s more interested in the Warriors game on TV. The next day, however, Elizabeth wakes to find that Geoffrey has already risen and gotten dressed – and is cleaning up the shattered remains of the glass she put her mystery flower into. Geoffrey has also transformed from a laidback straight guy, and into the kind of ramrod humorless personality that one finds at the DMV.

Matthew Bennel is a health inspector, who is trying to nail a snooty French restaurant for the lack of cleanliness in their kitchen (including an argument whether a specimen is a rat turd or a caper). Elizabeth tries to talk to him about Geoffrey’s odd behavior, but because Matthew is swept up in his investigation she can’t get anywhere with him.

The next day Elizabeth calls in sick and begins to follow Geoffrey around. Geoffrey doesn’t show up at his office, and instead spends his day exchanging large packages wrapped in brown paper with people that are completely unknown to Elizabeth. Geoffrey is a dentist, but the exchanges do not have even a feel of professional courtesy one would extend to one’s patient.

Now thoroughly freaked, Elizabeth goes over to Matthew’s house – who derails her fretting by making stir-fry. Elizabeth doesn’t know what to do, the person who calls himself Geoffrey doesn’t act like her boyfriend, and avoids all confrontation when Elizabeth asks him if he’s even angry about something. (Did I mention this takes place in California yet?) Matthew thinks Elizabeth should probably talk to his friend David Kibner, a famous pop-psychiatrist. Not as a patient, but as a concerned casual friend.

While driving there, Elizabeth and Matthew witness a crazed man shrieking about “They’re taking over! You’re next!” Only to be pursued by a group of people and hit by a car. When Matthew tries to file a witness report with the police, they don’t seem to be interested in it.

Kibner is having a book signing and during it, a distraught woman is trying to explain to him that the person who has brought her to see him is NOT her husband. Elizabeth can confirm that statement because the “husband” is one of the mysterious people “Geoffrey” saw earlier in the day. Kibner feels differently, however, and thinks that it’s just a hysterical reaction to a fear of separation (or some other psycho-babble). Elizabeth insists that the woman call her at her office though to talk further.

Upon hearing Elizabeth’s story, Kibner rehashes the same line that he used at the book signing, insisting that Elizabeth’s problem is that she’s withdrawing from her interaction with Matthew because of stress in their relationship. Elizabeth shrugs and concedes, but isn’t completely convinced.

Meanwhile, Jack Belicec and his wife Nancy are having problems of their own. Jack, a poet, is frustrated because he was to debut his book of poetry at Kibner’s signing, only to be completely upstaged by Kibner. Fortunately they run a day spa, so Jack goes to the sauna to relax while Nancy shoos the remaining customers out of the parlor. While cleaning up, she notices a misshapen body covered in a hairy, vegetable-like mass (think corn silk). Panicking, she fetches Jack (accidentally giving him a nosebleed in the process) who calls Matthew. Matthew examines the body and confirms that it’s humanoid, but there are no distinguishing features to it, just vague masses. Exhausted, Matthew lies down only to be woken up by Nancy’s screams as the body has now opened its eyes and begun to take on Jack’s features (including his nosebleed.) More worried than ever, Matthew rushes over to Elizabeth’s house and finds the same process of duplication going on in her own bedroom.

I love this version of Snatchers because it proves that you can remake a concept without making it tired and re-hashed, and still make it culturally relevant. A brilliant move was to shift the location from a small community out in the sticks and put it smack dab in the middle of a huge metropolis – disproving the theory of strength in numbers. Not very many people I know of who live in large cities can tell me what the names of their neighbors in their own apartment building are, let alone down the street. With the cultural diversity that urban centers provide also comes a kind of numbness: the best way to adapt to someone else’s strange behavior is not to notice it at all. This makes the invasion of pod people all the more frightening as you wouldn’t be able to tell whether your peers had been “assumed” until it was too late.

Line of the movie: “If you’re not crazy, you can do that thing with your eyes.”

Five stars. Look both ways before crossing.