The Invasion (I) (2007) User Reviews

Not bad... just not award worthy.

[steeped · 7/10 · 21 August 2007]

I didn't know much about Invasion before I walked into this movie. I heard the bad reviews from critics but hell, who listens to them? While watching this movie, I wasn't aware that The Invasion was re-filmed and rewritten. Apparently they rewrote it to add the twist in the end, as well as they added more action sequences with faster and better-angled camera work.

So the movie starts off right away with Carol Bennell (Nicole Kidman) scattering around the medicine cabinet in a Pharmacy whispering "stay awake, don't fall asleep" to herself. The neat fast-paced camera work kept you right into the movie from the beginning, but sadly the amazing beginning just doesn't match up to the pathetic ending. It seemed like they got tired of writing the movie so they decided to end it off with a simply and quick ending.

Some organism from a different planet crashed down to Earth and took over the citizens of the world. When the organism comes in contact with a human, they will become a different alien-ish like being obsessed with capturing people and affecting the world with their plague. When each person was affected, they would turn into these emotionless, mindless and painless zombies while they sleep. In search of her son, Carol Bennell gets affected and must stay awake so she would be able to save her boy. With help from Ben Driscoll (Daniel Craig) and his team of doctors, they go on the search for a cure, to save humanity and especially, save Carol.

I find that this movie gave off the message it was trying to, but in the process it failed at almost everything else. I was expecting, before walking into this movie that it would be filled with suspense with my heart jumping ever so often... but I wasn't scared or thrilled once. The suspense scenes had great music playing, had the great camera angles, but was just missing the spice to make it really work. And in regards to the end of the movie... I can promise you the writers got tired of having to rewrite a story and just through in a quick, painless ending. Course the quick painless ending resulted in annoyance for the audience.

While I walked out of the theater, I was thinking about this movie and how I would interpret it. One thing came to my head, and it was that the new directors did what they were supposed to - make me think and remember this movie once I leave the theater. This was NOT a forgettable movie, rather quite memorable. Sure there was a bad ending, but my eyes were attached to the screen throughout the whole film. I didn't look at my watch once, and for me that gives this movie a big bonus.

Not Bad..Nicole lookin good!

[rdambroso · 7/10 · 24 August 2007]

We went to see this last night. After all of the horrific reviews, I was expecting a real P.O.S. I was pleasantly surprised. While not to say it was an AWESOME movie or anything. It was good Sci Fi fun. I get irritated when a lot of movie buffs are looking for every film to be a Gone with the Wind or something. This was just a fun, smooth, entertaining production. I've never been a real fan of Nicole kidman, but I must say, she was quite fetching in this movie. If you are looking for the 50's version of War of the Worlds..The forbidden planet..John Carpenter's the THING...etc..it doesn't qualify. If you are looking for a fun Sci Fi Thriller to watch, it does the job.

Thriller entertainment

[paulijcalderon · 6/10 · 16 August 2017]

Invasion!.. of the people without emotions. This is pretty much a re-telling of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" with a modern setting and look. Interesting concepts are presented, but it turns out to be your run-of-the-mill thriller entertainment with recognizable actors. Nothing bad. It just took the Hollywood direction. The suspense is great in some scenes, especially in the first half. When we get to the climax things start to become too convenient and even a little predictable. What the movie really utilize well are the main leads. The characters are like-able which is super important here because you have to care for them when they are on the run from the invaders. The antagonists are annoying in just the right way. Imagine someone you know loosing all of their emotions and becoming an outer shelf of what that person used to be. That's a pretty scary idea. The movie plays it safe. What it lacks is some extra emotional punch and we never truly get that. So, I think the filmmakers should have gone for something even riskier at the end. The impact would have been much better. We get the Hollywood finale. And I guess it works in some ways because less people will feel paranoid after watching it.

It's alright. You can put the movie on and be entertained by the suspense and seeing Nicole Kidman be chased by weird stale people. The look of the picture is pretty nice. The blue-ish color tint fits the movie well. You should probably stick to the original "Body Snatchers", but if you wanna go for something that's easier to process then check this one out.

Not Perfect But Still Very Entertaining

[robyram · 25 August 2007]

I admit that I was hesitant about seeing "The Invasion" after reading some poor reviews and coming to this message board. I also was leery after learning that part of it was re-shot by different directors which is usually a very bad sign. Plus the fact that they give Kidman a kid in this film had me leery for I often grow weary of female leads in suspense/action/horror films having to protect children instead of other adults like male leads do especially if the kids are annoying.

So, I almost didn't see "The Invasion" after reading and hearing all of the complaints about no plot, no real character development, bad acting and poor directing/editing.

Yet, I finally agreed to just go with my gut and take a chance on a matinée show of "The Invasion." Boy, am I glad that I did, not only because I did not have to pay the outrageous full price of ten bucks but I actually liked this film.

Despite what some are saying this film does have a plot. People are actually doing things that lead to other plot points like the whole deal with Veronica Cartwright's character and Kidman's character leaving her son with the ex-husband. These two story lines lead to important discoveries and actions that happen later on in the film.

Also, there is character development. Kidman's character does develop because she's forced to change in order to survive and to protect herself and her son. The warm relationship between Kidman's character and her son and Ben also is established.

So beyond these relationships do we really need to dwell on the other characters for too long? After all this is a plot driven movie not a character driven movie. Besides, if they had taken time to thoroughly get into everyone else's back story people would be whining about the movie being too long. But I digress.

Also, I thought that all of the actors did a good job especially Kidman. She showed good range from being a caring psychiatrist, to a loving mother to a terrified woman to a desperate mother who would do anything to protect her child. I also like the mood and tone of this film. Granted the Pod People in the 1956 and 1978 versions were a tad bit creepier but I liked this film better than the 1978 version overall and I didn't miss that crazy scream. However, the 1956 version is definitely a classic.

Sure "The Invasion" is not perfect and it has it flaws and I feel that the studio probably should have left the original version alone. After all, the majority of the film is stronger than the last half which is obviously where the re-shoots took place. Still despite the unnecessary out of order time cuts, and a tad too many car crashes, the film still worked for me. I was definitely entertained.

Now that's saying a lot especially since I went in with low expectations.

you'll understand why it spent one year on a shelf......

[wildpeace10 · 6/10 · 19 August 2007]

i'm a big fan of those invasion of the body snatchers film and also of nicole kidman so i was excited to hear that a remake was being done.

But in trying to put new blood in the new version,they took out so many things that made the 1978 version so thrilling.

No pods,no transformation while a human is sleeping, no nudity and no powerful alien screams.

Not only that,but very few surprises and not a lot of tense suspense either. i was feeling such a low level of emotions watching this... as if i was one of the film's zombies myself!!!

This is probably the most expensive remake of the series and yet,most of the special effects are either nowhere to be found or low budget. The newest thing here is that the zombies sometimes kind of spit/vomit on their victims,a new thing that i just couldn't appreciate!

The best new variation here is the addition of a story plot stating the fact that her kid couldn't be contaminated and therefore has to be eliminated.

This then gaves a very powerful motivation to escape,a motivation that anybody can understand.

The additional scenes involving what seems to be a two part car chase(one with fire on the car and one without)is just too little, too late to turn this average film into a must see film.

Do not Sleep!

[claudio_carvalho · 7/10 · 2 March 2008]

While returning to Earth, the space-bus explodes and the fragments bring an alien virus that recodes the human DNA. In Washington, the psychiatrist Carol Bennell (Nicole Kidman) observes the modification of the behavior of one of her clients first, then in her former husband and finally in the population in general. Together with her friend Dr. Ben Driscoll (Daniel Craig) and the researcher Dr. Stephen Galeano (Jeffrey Wright), they discover that the extraterrestrial epidemic affects human beings while sleeping and that her son Ollie, who had smallpox with Acute Disseminated Encephalomyelitis (ADEM) when he was a baby, is immune to the disease and may save mankind from the outbreak.

Don Siegel's "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" is one of the best sci-fi ever, therefore most of the remakes are good because the story of earth being invaded through replicas of the human beings is excellent. "The Invasion" is maybe the third remake of the classic that I have watched and I liked it in spite of having an optimistic and corny conclusion. I do not dare to compare the classic movie of Don Siegel with this remake, but I have found it very reasonable and entertaining. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Invasores" ("Invaders")

Invasion of the Script Snatchers

[brenttraft · 4/10 · 19 August 2007]

"The Invasion" had a lot going for it. It had two big stars, an acclaimed director, a big time producer, and a time tested premise. The only thing missing was a script.

"The Invasion" does not follow the same story as the earlier movies. They took the premise and made a new story. The new story has only a threadbare plot, no character development, and some of the most banal dialog I have heard in recent years. At 93 minutes, there are long passages that go nowhere and do nothing for the story.

Whoever gave the green light to this production without having a decent script first should be fired.

Despite that, there are some parts that are watchable. It is just frustrating that they could not have come up with a better story and better characters.

Better than I thought, tension but not terror

[spoiler-3 · 7/10 · 14 August 2007]

I should start this off by saying I saw the 1978 Invasion of the Body Snatchers when I was seven years old. I think I still have nightmares of the final scene. That said, this 2007 remake (the Invasion) has some moments of edge of your seat tension, along with a few screams by a raucous preview crowd.

I think Nicole Kidman does a good job as Carol Bennell, a professional, single mom whose world revolves around her son Oliver and her job as a psychiatrist. The movie starts with a quick snap-shot of Carol desperately trying to take meds and caffeine to stay awake. I didn't think that scene was necessary, as all the previews and tag-lines have stressed the "do Not Fall Asleep" theme.

The alien invasion comes by way of another tragic Shuttle incident. This is a necessary plot point but is hardly expanded upon.

For most of the movie the turned human-aliens pursue Carol as she desperately tries to get to her son. It seems almost matter of fact that while what seems like 99% of the city's population is after her, she stays pretty calm. I won't state much else about the plot details only to say that it seemed to me that for a good portion of the movie, all you see are human chase scenes... lots of running and car chases. Nothing really scary about any of them.

I had fore-warned my wife that given my experience with the 1978 Sutherland/Goldblum movie that she would be terrified. That was not the case at all, she actually liked the tense scenes and enjoyed the movie as a whole, but scared she was not. I liked the movie and have purposely left out any references to politics or commentaries on the current state of the world. I thought some of those scenes were crow-barred into the film.

Just my 2 cents.

At turns mind-numbingly obvious and clichéd

[tsunetomo1659 · 3/10 · 17 August 2007]

I actually went into this movie with pretty high expectations, considering that the Wachowski brothers were involved and it seemed like an interesting premise from the trailers. Well, as it turned out, somehow all of that potential was utterly wasted. From beginning to end this movie is boring, predictable, and terribly clichéd. I kept hoping until the end that at some point it would get better, but bit for bit everything in this movie is the epitome of all that is trite and stale in sci-fi movies and little to nothing of what is interesting and original.

Every crummy sci-fi/horror movie starts out with little hints of whatever fantastic thing is supposed to happen later, and so did The Invasion. Except, in The Invasion this whole section keeps pointing out things to the audience that were mind-numbingly obvious. "My husband is not my husband anymore..." Oh really? Well surely she's just some nut-case and it has nothing to do with the storyline that's been explained on TV commercials and in movie trailers for the past several months! I honestly don't understand why filmmakers like these frequently feel the need to spend half of the movie beating the audience over the head with information that they could (and probably already did) find in a one sentence synopsis of the film.

Per the typical, trite sci-fi/horror movie formula there's also a scene where the main character brings a same of something weird to a scientist and he examines it and conveniently explains everything that the audience needs to know about the substance/disease/alien race in a straightforward, uninteresting way. There are so many scenes like this where the characters are supposed to be revealing something new and interesting but it just comes out as if the writers think that the audience is a a bunch of slobbering morons who can't take a simple hint.

Here's one detail that particularly struck me for its idiocy: about a third of the way through the movie, there's a scene where the Russian guy (who cares what his name is) basically explains (through a convenient monologue) the thesis of the movie which goes something like, "a world without newspapers constantly talking about violence and hatred is a world without humanity." Later on, there are some segments showing on a TV that say that fighting has ended in Iraq and then Daniel Craig's character gives another speech that is very obviously supposed to be a counterpoint to the first one that goes something like, "in our world, there is no need to hurt one another." At the end, after the aliens are nearly destroyed Daniel Craig talks about how 87 people just died in Iraq. As if ALL this information wasn't enough to make you draw some sort of a connection, they just have to drill it directly into your skull by replaying the Russian guy's quote again. I could mention plenty more things like this, but I'm starting to get annoyed.

Too many cooks

[Chris Knipp · 6/10 · 20 August 2007]

This updating of Jack Finney's 'Body Snatchers' story, directed (according to the credits anyway) by Oliver Hirschbiegel of the gripping last-days-of-Hitler film 'The Downfall,' clumsily interweaves a low-keyed mood piece with some loud mayhem--noisy car chases and a helicopter rescue in which Nicole Kidman proves to be a mean racing driver. She also on several occasions kills some people in cold blood--rare moments of fun for an audience starved for a little violence relevant to the original plot. There isn't a lot else happening on screen, despite the fact that masses of Americans are being "turned" by an alien virus into soberly dressed, tidy zombies whose aim is to create a more orderly, peaceful world. The irony--though clearly underdeveloped--is that this positive transformation isn't what people want. "They," the infected ones, are trapping people, infecting them, and taking away their personalities. They sneeze on them and the virus takes effect during their REM sleep. There's a new twist somewhere here about how visions of a better world get compromised in the execution, but it gets lost in the botched result.

There are no monsters or gooey ectoplasm, just little sheaths of clear tissue and some people whose faces glaze over--all of which, from the horror-action-movie standpoint, comes off as pretty tame. And the creepy psychological elements--and the ideas about various social and political issue--aren't allowed to develop fully either.

This new scaling down of the old story appears to have all the earmarks of a low budget piece except a low budget. With big crowd scenes and the likes of Craig and Kidman signed on, it must have cost a few bucks. Actually, Craig did this before he got the 007 franchise, which explains a lot. In any case the technical package reads as mediocre. Lacking is the spectacular excitement of the 'Alien' movies or earlier 'Body Snatchers' ones---or the military ironies and fast action of the recent '28 Weeks Later,' which like this (which is set in DC), is full of political references. But in the case of '28 Weeks' the political satire is integrated into the action in ways that are far more cinematic and satirically effective. What went wrong here?

Apparently what happened to 'The Invasion' was too many surgeries by opposing doctors. Hirschbiegel originally had a low-keyed horror movie going on; we feel its chilling menace in the early sequences. Then, because of some poor test audience responses, the producers called upon the Wachowski brothers to inject some "action" into the piece. This was when uncredited sub-director James McTeigue came along.

The disconnect is super-evident. Implausibility would have perhaps been inevitable in this story anyway, but the clumsy patchwork destroys the mood and resolves everything with super-conventional rescues and a too-easy off-scene medical solution that restores everything to normal. Oliver's little friend Gene (Eric Benjamin) who had turned into a nasty little monster, is suddenly "cured" at the end and, having lost his parents, now lives with them. That's unintentionally creepy, and a sign of how poorly structured the screenplay wound up being with too many cooks.

The tie-in between the alien virus and the leads is simply made. Carol Bennell (Kidman) is a psychiatrist. People are certainly beginning to act strangely and as a behavior professional she's qualified to note that. Those who've "turned" don't sweat or show emotion. Ms. Kidman says, "My patient's husband was infected by an alien virus and all I did was prescribe an anti-psychotic drug. What an idiot I am!" Yes, but how was she to know? Her ex-husband Tucker (Jeremy Northam) has "turned," and when Carol suspects this, Tucker's sudden desire to have their little boy Oliver (Jackson Bond) spend time with him after a two-year absence is deeply sinister. (This movie might not be good for small children whose parents have separate households.) Carol's boyfriend--wait, make that "best friend"--Ben (Daniel Craig), is a doctor, who luckily knows Dr. Stephen Galeano (Jeffrey Wright, a brilliant actor completely wasted here), an ace virus scientist. The creepy menace of early scenes, which is truly disturbing, is thrown away with a too-easy resolution when vaguely referenced government efforts come together, the invasion is eradicated (off screen) and little Oliver is saved from his creepy dad.

A movie like 'The Invasion,' which takes an old zombie/alien theme and injects it with some political references, incidentally makes one realize why Phillip K. Dick's writing is so often adapted to the screen: Dick's books and stories are packed with original and provocative ideas. The thinking behind The Invasion is sloppy and skimpy. It seems to be talking primarily about how chilling and oppressive do-gooders can be. This could be seen as a dark vision of how projects to make the world better may be compromised by authoritarianism. Jeffrey Wright is in the lab finding a cure, and as Americans get their humanity back, violence starts up again. The way to stay human is to keep the world a mess. The irony is heavy handed. Iraq, Iraq, Iraq comes at us from TV screens; then as those infected with the alien virus begin to take over, there is peace. The idea of a conflict between wanting to change for the better and clinging to our old animal instincts is potentially an interesting one. But it's not helped in this movie by throwing in references to other current stuff like distrust of government, fear of a medicine-resistant pandemic, and squabbling with other ex-bloc nations in the Russian embassy. And none of these themes is well integrated into the action--nor do the events themselves seem menacing or exciting enough to outweigh the skimpiness of the ideas.

This is a clear example of what happens when a studio tests a movie on an audience, worries that it's too arty or subtle, and calls in a team of fixers. The result is a hack job that has good moments, but ends up not fully satisfying any audience.

Travesty

[herrnoel · 5/10 · 19 August 2007]

The 70s remake of this film succeeded because it was a chilling psychological thriller with little to no horror film elements and a biting ending that lingered with you for days.

This film starts out with the premise and setup, but quickly deviates into a different film -- a rehashing of 28 days later and outbreak with illogical, formulaic action sequences that are literally lifted straight from any zombie film. As usual with sub-par screenplays, the plot requires illogical and implausible events to move forward and provide thrills. In the end, it couldn't make up its mind whether it was an intellectually compelling, psychological thriller or yet another zombie action film? The ending was ... eh I don't even want to explain it.

CHEER! - (8 stars out of 10)

[BJG-Reviews · 8/10 · 9 March 2021]

The stage curtains open ...

I am probably of the minority here, but I actually really enjoyed this latest re-make in the "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" line of movies. I even liked it better than the black & white original, placing this at #2 behind the 1978 version (which was the best one IMO). Certainly hands above the rather plain and flat 1993 version. I really liked what Nicole Kidman brought to the table here - a fun film to watch.

This time around, our main protagonist is Carol Bennell (Kidman), a psychiatrist who is a single mother, who's ex-husband is a CDC agent who is heading the investigation into a space shuttle crash which has captured the attention of the world. Unknown to everyone involved, the shuttle brought with it to Earth's surface an unknown organism which starts off a chain of events that would change everyone's live. Bennell first notices it when one of her patients, Wendy (played by Veronica Cartwright who was also in the 1978 version), claims that her husband is not really her husband. Before Bennell knows it, she is running to save both herself and her son from an unspeakable end.

Of the four movies, this one was clearly the more action-packed version with foot races, car chase scenes, explosions, and helicopters. Yet, I felt it still delivered a healthy dose of tension and paranoia ... not really knowing who you can trust or who to run from. Nicole Kidman delivers a fine performance, and Jackson Bond was perfect as her son. All of our supporting actors were also very good here, with believable performances.

I highly recommend this one. It is anything but boring, and provides an adrenalin rush in addition to the fear of becoming an emotionless, empty shell of your former self. The angle is different here, but still effective. I give this one a solid 8 stars out of 10. I've watched it a few times over the years, and have enjoyed it just as much with each viewing. Stay tuned ... apparently, there is yet another re-make in the works!

A good little sci-fi flick that isn't spectacular but not a disaster either

[Robert_duder · 7/10 · 25 August 2007]

Reading several other reviews on IMDb I came to the conclusion that many regular film goers saw the same thing in The Invasion that I did...it was okay period. It was a good flick, entertaining, worthwhile and by the time you get out to the car you're thinking about what's on TV later that night...it doesn't stick with you. It has no especially powerful moments or performances, but while you're watching it you're not disappointed. Critics trash talked the film like it was the worst thing of the year and it's not by a long shot. In fact it's a fun night at the movies without having to think about why something is going on. If you think too hard about The Invasion then yes you'll walk out hating it. The film is wrought with plot holes and even a bit of a non-conforming time line made even more confusing by an unnecessary jumble of chronological plot points. Flash backs and flash forwards and things that don't help the story and stick out like crazy. They also seem to rush through several things to make sure they get to the main story and tie it up in a neat little 2 hour window (or a little less.) Everything with The Invasion seems to happen so quickly and you're trying to keep up but then once you get to the heart of the film it keeps you riveted to your seat.

Nicole Kidman is a terrific actress, and very versatile and she has done her share of playing the 'scream queen' type role having performed in other thriller/horrors such as the superb "The Others" and "Dead Calm" and she definitely has this ability. She is beautiful and almost too exotic looking to play a down to earth type person but you do become enthralled in her adventure against these zombie type beings. Daniel Craig is terrific as her best friend/boyfriend Ben Driscoll. He almost seemed like he purposely holding back a better performance to not overshadow Kidman but the script for both of them was pretty weak. The two of them together make a great team given a better story. Young newcomer Jackson Bond really holds his own with Craig and Kidman as Kidman's son Oliver. He has a lot of screen time and really does a terrific job and I'm sure he'll be an up and coming star. Jeremy Northam is Kidman's ex-husband who is one of the first to be infected being a CDC (Center for Disease Control) agent. I would say that his performance is a little bland but that seems like an ironic statement given that he is supposed to be an emotionless zombie like alien but it didn't really impress me and he was forgettable compared to the other cast members.

The film has great potential (obviously being a remake of a classic.) I have not seen the original film nor it's 2nd remake but I would like to in hopes that it might fill in some of the gaps sadly left by this installment. It seemed like they rushed to get to what they thought they could really sink their teeth into. The eerie world where everyone is being converted and the normal are forced to act without emotion should be a lot more powerful but it loses something...I just don't know what. The disease spreads very quickly and the heroes (Craig and Kidman) just seem to catch on to and accept what's going on far too fast. Basically it could have been dragged out over a trilogy (not that I would recommended that for this film.) Still sci-fi fans might get a kick out of this latest remake and even a movie goer won't be disappointed but it won't likely make any of your top ten lists this year or ever. 7/10

Worse than you might think, considering the talent.

[SinsOfArcadia · 3/10 · 20 August 2007]

The Invasion | 3/10

We are all finally greeted with the 49th remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, and yes, it's every bit as unnecessary as you might think. Considering the talent involved in this project, however, I'm actually a bit disturbed at how bad it turned out. Oliver Hirschbiegel directed the outstanding WWII film "Downfall" a few years ago, and Nicole Kidman is among Hollywood's greatest actresses of this or any other era. Baffled by how terrible the film turned out to be, I did some research. Apparently the producers of the film weren't happy with Hirschbiegel's vision, so they went ahead and had a completely different director (James McTeigue, director of V for Vendetta) re-shoot entire scenes. This was clearly a terrible idea, but probably not the only reason for it's failure.

The plot presented here, as thin as it is to begin with, basically goes nowhere at all. Kidman's character contracts the 'virus' from her ex-husband in an attempt to take her child from him to a treatment center of sorts. What's worse is that nothing of even remote interest happens before this, and we're not exactly treated to edge of your seat suspense afterwards, either. Kidman spends the rest of the film in search of this so-called treatment center while finding out along the way that her son is somehow immune to the virus. The virus, for the sake of information, can only fully convert you after you enter REM sleep. It's alien nature and motive are barely touched upon at all. There is of course the obligatory sub plot of lovers, unconvincingly played out between Kidman and Craig, that are best friends but really think it's best if they stayed that way even though they clearly want to be with each other. You know, the usual Lifetime network effect. We're also given a handful of mediocre to terrible supporting characters that are each given their share of awful dialogue to delight us with.

I suppose it's not among the worst films I've ever seen, but it is without a doubt a miserable one. There are a few solid scenes with Kidman that quite literally save this from being a complete and utter waste of 93 minutes, but even those are few and far between. On the whole the film fails at literally every genre it attempts or presents, from Sci-Fi to Action and, worst of all, Horror. This is the least horrifying Horror film I've ever had the displeasure of sitting through. I hope for the sake of film that this talented director chooses to build on the promise he showed in Downfall by putting this embarrassment as far behind him as possible. To his credit, though, I would have to assume that whatever Hirschbiegel originally filmed was at least a few steps above the final product that was somehow unleashed upon the viewer.

If your a fan of any other iteration you will hate this.

[manakin33 · 17 August 2007]

Hollywood destroyed everything good about this film.

There was a resounding creepiness that looms over the body snatcher remakes and the original. This film misses that on every mark. No pods... No siren screams... And the ending, well, is a slap in the face to the concept.

If your not a fan or have never seen any other versions you might think it is OK. But thats it, just OK. They screwed up one of the scariest concepts ever thought up. Permormences were OK. It had one or two bright points but overall it was crap.

Take the cgi out of war of the worlds and you have invasion... thats not a good thing.

does not deserve so much indifference

[Nefi · 7/10 · 20 October 2007]

This latest incarnation of the famous alien pod people invasion story has gone through so much misfortune that I consider it a miracle that it was even given a cinematic release. As a matter of fact that said release can be deemed a cover-up. The studio, as if ashamed of its treatment of the film during production has done nothing to promote it. Thus, as a fan of any science fiction movie and someone who has watched and enjoyed all three previous versions of the story, it was understandable why I was worried about it entering the local cinema last night. Now I can safely say that all the indifference and negativity is quite unfair. Nowadays people sadly tend to be prejudiced about films prior to their releases, getting affected by positive or negative hype. What I watched last night was pretty decent science-fiction if not ranking among the best of the genre.

First of all, I liked the way the story has been updated for yet another installment. Abel Ferrera's update in 1993 kept the basic premise of people being replaced by alien pods during their sleep and with the support of nice special effects was highly effective. This new version completely drops the pods in favour of a virus that reprogrammes the human DNA to turn it into a lifeless and monotonic being, devoid of any features that define it as a separate human identity in the first place. Thus the story comes bang up to date, displaying all the anxieties of current global society as regards the genetic issues and controversies. All the scientific aspects of the story appeared believable and probable to me.

By turning humans into monotonic beings, the alien virus actually manages the utopia of definite peace in the world. This was a nice and well-thought-of point of irony by the filmmakers and continued to resonate in my mind after the film ended. Is it better or worse for us to keep our personalities intact, with all our inherent genetical psychological defects included that create all those never-ending conflicts both at global and daily life basis? Nice philosophical aspects of the screenplay and a well-deserved 10 points to the film for that matter.

Upon this ground base, the usual stages of the Body Snatchers story structure are ticked in an economical running time of 100 minutes, but with an added twist. Here the filmmakers try to do something different and tell the story in a very quick fashion. The viewer experiences the same sense of confusion as the heroine. She goes through her daily routine while the inhabitants of the city around her change abruptly during every passage of nighttime and sleep. The panic she feels after 3-4 days is very believable as a consequence. This sense of helplessness is further enhanced by a style of flash-forward editing structure utilised in some scenes. I found myself quite breathless during certain parts of the film as a result.

The two high profile stars of the film give decent performances, with special mention going to Nicole Kidman. She reminded me of Hitchcockian heroines, appearing cold from outside but taking control of the situation if necessary. She is in my opinion the right casting choice since her perfect features and stiff posture blend wonderfully with the background of lifeless virus-influenced people during the mid section of the film, making her imitation tactics for survival believable. Also I liked the chemistry she had with both the child actor playing her son and Daniel Craig.

The highly criticised ending was also satisfying to me. With the vaccine changing people back to their normal selves, the violence and war throughout the world continues as if nothing had happened. The alien phase is experienced as a blackout by the brain so humanity can safely go on in its routine of self destruction until the end of time. The doubtful look on the heroine's face at the last shot while the latest TV announcements about the killings in Iraq is heard in the background neatly wraps the story. No alien invasion can stop humans from being humans, for better or worse.

Get ready for the plague.Good sci-fi thriller.

[blanbrn · 7/10 · 18 August 2007]

"Invasion" isn't to me a classic, yet it's entertaining and worth a watch with some interesting moments and good acting from Nicole Kidman. Kidman stars as Carol Bennell a Washington, D.C. psychiatrist who one day meets with a patient who claims her husband is no longer really her husband. Soon that will be the norm as the viewer finds that the whole national capital is under the control of people who are zombie like and act very different. All of this apparently resulted from particles left over from a space shuttle crash which has left some type of dead virus that has affected humans. The virus is mostly transmitted thru saliva and liquids as it's crazy during moments of the film as the infected will spit on the last of the human race to try and inflict them. So it's up to Carol to save the day thru science and experiment with chemicals at the national government lab with the help of a scientist(played by Daniel Craig). As well portrayed in the film this overtakes all headlines just as in real life when such outbreaks happen they become media darlings and we like forget about Iraq and terrorism. The movie is also interesting and entertaining with car chases and crashes and the need to save the human race. And anything is worth a watch with the charming and beautiful Nicole Kidman her performance here was glossy and soulful.

I Kept an Open Mind

[Kashmirgrey · 4/10 · 24 August 2007]

You hafta' go into every movie with an open mind if you're going to give it a fair assessment, right? Well, I did exactly that with "The Invasion". Despite all the heavy and (quite) ugly criticism this movie received, it had a fair cast and it isn't too often that Nicole Kidman is in something completely awful. Let it be known, as well, that I am a big fan of both the original and the 1978 versions of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers". It is reasonable to speculate that fans of either of those two films will be disappointed with this latest stab at the "body snatcher" storyline.

However, I asked myself, is the point to compare this film against its predecessors or should I evaluate this film on its own merits alone? I decided the latter was the right course and with this in mind, I watched "The Invasion".

The film opens with a very frantic Carol Bennell (played by Nicole Kidman) rummaging through the shelves of a pharmacy. She is searching for sleep suppressants. We are then taken back in a recent past where a space shuttle crash lands into the countryside. The shuttle's wreckage has brought back something with it. From the moment that Bennell's ex-husband (played Jeremy Northam) pricks his fingers on a foreign organism, life becomes a serious drag for the (evidently, terrible) human species. Bennell, who is a psychiatrist, doesn't get it at first when one of her patients (played by Veronica Cartwright who also starred in the 1978 "Invasion of the Body Snatchers) irately claims her husband isn't her husband. But it doesn't take long before Bennell figured out that all is not right in Everytown, USA.

This film was not awful. This was, by no means, the worst of the "snatchers" make-overs. 1993's "Body Snatchers" is my nominee for that award. There were some moments in this film that worked well such as a brief, but tense scene when Bennell and her son (played by Jackson Bond) are unsure whether the other is... them. I also liked the "attempt" at a different approach to the body snatching "method". All in all, for me what kept me watching was Kidman. No, not just because she's a super-hottie (although it never hurts.) She adeptly became Bennell and breathed life into her character. I actually thought this was one of her better performances.

This could have been an excellent film, but as is all too often the case these days, character development was not a priority. Beyond Kidman as Bennell, character development was non-existent. How people are being snatched, also, is never adequately, not even remotely, explained. Wherein the other snatcher films, while the victim sleeps their body rotted away and their alien replacement is created within a giant pea-pod, in "The Invasion" the process is never identified. This makes for a very weak ending. Truly, with today's SFX, this could have been an extraordinary "revelation". What was most disappointing was the attempt at social and political commentary. Good grief! I cannot think of a more articulate adjective then just plain...lame.

Kidman delivers

[jb_campo · 7/10 · 25 December 2018]

The Invasion is a remake of sorts of the famous Invasion of the Body Snatchers. A space shuttle crashes to earth and with it, some sort of creepy cellular life form. People start acting strangely - they are not themselves.

Kidman stars as a psychologist with a connection to the CDC in the form of an ex-husband. Daniel Craig co-stars as a Doctor/boy friend who basically supports Kidmans efforts to save her family.

The movies is a long chase film, across trains, cars, foot races. Kidman races to save her son who is in the clutches of her ex-husband whose plans are evil. More and more people become absorbed by the evil invaders. You start to wonder whom you can trust. If you show emotion, you get arrested and then bad things happen to you.

That's pretty much it. Can Kidman stay awake and save the world? Can her son help her? What will happen with her boy friend? How can we get rid of her annoying husband - yep, he was annoying.

Kidman's performance was electric, switching emotions to hide herself among a crowd of possessed. Then back to herself to save her son. She was terrific. Otherwise, this was a worthy remake with enough thrills to keep you going. Enjoy.

Half of this movie on cutting room floor

[oregoncycle · 4/10 · 25 August 2007]

I for one would have liked to see the directors cut. After watching this movie the first thing I said to my friends was that this movie has been cut and re-cut. Now after reading that the producers brought in another director then re-wrote & re-shot chunks of this movies you understand the disjointed feel of this movie. There is a flow that happens on the set of movies that gels most movies together. So often good actors pull a poor script up and we get a fairly good movie as a result. This movie before cutting was worse then this final cut? hard to believe.

I will watch this if and when they have a directors cut on DVD. And the spoiler is weak ending ala 'war of the worlds'

Explores The Body Snatcher World

[JoelChamp85 · 6/10 · 17 March 2021]

I love the Body Snatchers series, and this one's pretty well done. Though, Nicole plays an intelligent woman who is actually really dumb. She's almost the last person in the city to figure out what's happening even though she witnesses the most evidence. Apart from that the film is well made and worth a watch.

The Fourth is the Worst

[Coventry · 5/10 · 24 May 2009]

This is already the fourth large-scaled film version based on Jack Finney's legendary story "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" and I must say this is just one too many. The two oldest films (the 50's film directed by Don Siegel and the 70's version by Philip Kaufman) are righteously regarded at as genre milestones, but the "newer" films don't manage to convey the creepy basic premise in a good old-fashioned and atmospheric way. Abel Ferrara's 1993 film "Body Snatchers" still contained a few very effective moments of fright, but this latest; big-names-involved version became somewhat of a disappointment. It's is clearly noticeable that director Oliver Hirschbiegel ("Downfall", "The Experiment") wanted to make his English language debut like a genuine throwback to paranoid & claustrophobic 50's Sci-Fi, with enthralling suspense, mysteriousness and character development. Unfortunately, however, the producers wanted more spectacle and explosions, and thus hired other people for re-writes and re-shoots. The finished product evidently suffers from this, so my advice would be to try and focus as much as possible on the substantially terrific sequences and the creepily-themed ambiance. The familiar concept is still, according to me at least, the archetype of superior Science Fiction. What if some sort of extraterrestrial force caused people to metamorphose into soulless, emotionless and insensitive replicas of themselves overnight? For some reason, I always found this the most nightmarishly plausible Sci-Fi formula, and apparently many genre fanatics with me. This time, the "epidemic" is generated when a US Space Shuttle, containing the unidentified alien substance, crashes down on earth. Shortly after, the entire population is gradually getting replaced by exact copies. Psychiatrist Carol Bennell desperately tries to get to her son, who's staying with his estranged father and happened to be one of the first victims of the infection. Apart from a couple of really powerful sequences and a few isolated moments of pure shock (the tunnel-accident, for example), "The Invasion" is a rather redundant movie that adds absolutely nothing to the original masterpieces. The alien menace isn't very detectable here and the fear in the eyes of the survivors is never fully convincing. The additions to the original storyline, like for example the sub plot on immunity, are inefficient and not compelling. Nicole Kidman, of whom I'm usually not a big fan, is quite good looking in this film and her performance is more than adequate. Her male co-stars Daniel Craig, Jeremy Northam and Jeffrey Wright all give away much more intense and plausible performances, however. I hope that, one day, perhaps Hirschbiegel director's cut will be available and we get to see the film as it was initially intended: slow-brooding, uncanny and petrifying.

Taunt and Smart, Kidman shines here.

[wji222 · 8/10 · 31 August 2007]

First of all, this is not a scary movie. Instead, there is an atmosphere of tenseness, especially when Kidman and Craig's characters must pretend to have already changed in order to survive. Kidman easily carries this film, and she makes you believe the plot line that another actress would have easily made ludicrous. I have read some critical reviews questioning the casting of Kidman in this role, mostly due to the fact that her icy demeanor is seemingly miscast in a role that calls for emotion. However, I believe that it is this very demeanor that allows her to be believable in this film. She plays an extremely smart psychologist who catches on to the situation fast. She is an analyzer, and it is her lack of deep emotion that allows for her to think quickly and critically, without it, she would have easily succumbed to the body snatchers and there would have been no movie. There is indeed a liberal undercurrent through this movie. It questions our role in Iraq but more importantly, it questions our actions as a species, our emotions, our anger, our selfishness, and their effects on our society. To create a world in which everyone is equal, rational, no war, no disease, no famine, no inequality is what the body snatchers are offering...and for this movie goer, there was at least one point in the film in which I found myself asking whether that would be so bad. Sure, the ending was a little too quick and tidy, but overall, this was a great movie.

New version with two superstars as protagonists and exceptional production values

[ma-cortes · 6/10 · 9 March 2009]

This fourth adaptation about vintage novel deals a space shuttle blows up and the fragments transfer an alien virus that recodes the human beings DNA. It creates an altering the human behaviour. Meanwhile a psychiatrist named Carol(Nicole Kidman) must to protect her son(Bond) who may hold the means to avoid the extraterrestrial invasion. The mysterious epidemic from outer space is spread her friends, ex-husband and Washington people, everybody are being take over by emotionless,cold behaving. Carol is helped by her good friend Doctor Driscoll(Daniel Craig) and scientific Doctor Stephen(Jeffrey Wright).

This scary Sci-Fi displays a tense screenplay based on Jack Finney novel titled ¨Body snatchers¨. Packs suspense,chills, thrills, spectacular car pursuits and pretty turns and twists. Good performances from Nicole Kidman, Daniel Craig and Jeffrey Wright.Appears in secondary role Veronica Carwight as deranged wife, she acted in the second version by Philip Kauffman, besides cameo role by Jeff Wincott as a security agent,he's a B series star. The motion picture is professionally directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel, though with no originality. His greatest hits were ¨The experiment¨ and ¨The downfall¨.

Another version about this known story are : the classic adaptation which emerged as a cinema classic directed by Donald Siegel(1956) with Kevin McCarthy and Dana Wynter, concerning about mysterious seeds duplicating people ; a magnificent semi-sequel which takes place in San Francisco directed by Phil Kauffman(78) with Donald Sutherland, Brooke Adams, and Leonard Nimoy; and inferior rendition by Abel Ferrara(1994) that takes place in a military base with Forrest Whitaker , Meg Tilly and Gabriella Anwar.

Another Remake Gone Bad........

[patrickmmc · 1/10 · 29 January 2008]

I won't go into details telling about this film. Simply this is just another remake gone bad. For those who wish to be thrilled and scared, see the 1978 film "Invasion of the Body Snatchers." It scared the crap out of me when I was young. I never forgot it either. Unfortunately, this film will be forgotten as quickly as it was thrown together and released.

It's amazing how a film over 20 years old could be better than this pile of steaming #$@#*. But the fact is that the further we move along in technology, the worse the films seem to get. All imagination and creativity seem to have been lost. I am probably the worst critic of them all. I haven't seen much of anything in new millennium releases that I would call outstanding or even good. This film is no different, and I suggest that anyone having been born early enough to remember the original or even 78's version, don't waste your time on this pathetic attempt. It's just a sad, lackluster, unimaginative pop-corn affair.