Ryan Watches A Motion Picture #44: Body Snatchers (1993)

Ugh. You can't hear it, but there's a terrifying wail coming out of that inhuman face.

I'm a fan of the classic communist-fearing Invasion of the Body Snatchers, and I was moved to tears and fits of hysterical shouting when I discovered that this 90s update is really very good as well.

Director Abel Ferrara isn't afraid to move his camera in interesting ways, and the movie really thrives for it. A held shot, for example, on a sleeping woman can suddenly turn very sinister with a seemingly simple and slow tilt of the camera and a slight colour change. In general, the special effects in the film are genuinely horrifying: people are invaded by disgusting, worming, creeping tendrils that hook into you like alien veins because that's what they fucking well are supposed to be. Family members crumble to dust, half-grown duplicates writhe and crack with blood, and pod people gestate in their disgusting pods before our eyes.

Body Snatchers feels relentless and tense, and its most horrifying aspect is the constant sense that the characters in the film are too late. Too late to survive, too late to save the day.

So: Really very creepy. Something moved in my bed that night and I had to sit up and stare for a few seconds.