Essay 3: "The Cinema is Truth 24 Frames Per Second"

Kylie Dekin
Adam Weinstein
English 101-099
12 October 2007

Simply Horror

Invasion of the Body Snatchers is a classic horror science fiction movie created in the 1950’s. There can be many different themes pulled out of this movie. Two movie reviews written by Tim Dirk and John Whitehead, both believed that the movie was about communism, Nuclear War and McCarthyism. All of these historic events were occurring during this time. People could easily relate to these events because they were living through it. However, today people cannot relate to these same events because they are no longer happening. Instead, today we are dealing with terrorism and war in Iraq. This is one reason why I do not agree that the theme is communism and McCarthyism. I think that Invasion of the Body Snatchers was created to simply be a horror science fiction movie. Scientific outburst of new inventions, theories and ideas were just coming to a head. People today can also relate to this because we now live in a scientific world. Automobiles, computers, cell phones, and IPods are all getting hi-tech. Scientists are cloning animals, changing genes of unborn babies, and coming up with vacations for many different kinds of illnesses. Don Siegel created this movie to scare people of new scientific inventions going completely wrong. The characters in The Invasion of the Body Snatchers were all scared of the scientific idea of clones attempting to take over the world.

I did not live in the McCarthyism and communist era so I do not know how much people actually feared McCarthyism in the United States. I do not know who was all affected by this fear. Just like terrorism, some people are affected by it more than others are. Everybody’s beliefs and reactions will be different. On the other hand, was the idea that the theme was communism one big publicity stunt to draw more viewers to come see this classic horror movie of its time to make more money? There is no way for me knowing unless I did some heavy-duty research before watching the movie. However, I did not do that. Therefore, when I watched this movie for the first time, I automatically thought the movie was a classic horror science fiction movie. I just think that Doctor Miles Bennell was trying to save his town from a new scientific invention going bad. The giant seed pods were taking over his friends’ innocent lives one by one and making them emotionless people. They no longer could feel love or give love. They all think the same. Today, we would not think of this as communism, because we know what clones are the exact copy of an organism. In addition, during this communism era, psychologists were considered witch doctors because they talked to the “crazy” people. However, we would think this as normal today. So many people talk to psychologist for numerous reasons, not because we are witches talking to the devil. In the movie, they think the same. Dr. Bennell is sent to the emergency room where cops, doctors, and psychiatrists think he is going crazy. They are not going to listen to him until they see for themselves that he is telling the truth, which they do at the end of the movie.

In the twenty first century people believe that, a good horror movie is made of intense special affects, gory scenes, spooky music, dramatic deaths and famous actors. Thousands of dollars and a lot of time go toward all of these movies. However, sixty years ago this was not the case. Very little time and money was spent on movies. There was a little blood if any and very few special affects that help create horror movies in this era. What made movies scary in the early 1900s was the psychological themes. Invasion of the Body Snatchers is a movie with barley any special effects and no bloody deaths or gory scenes. What makes this movie so suspenseful is the spine-chilling music, the “slow building tension,” (Dirks) the romantic scenes, and the idea of new scientific inventions going bad. I think that people today would not agree with Whitehead saying that The Invasion of the Body Snatchers “is still considered the greatest of all the horror and science fiction classics” (Whitehead). People are so use to the special affects and computer generated movies that they would probably laugh at this old classic because of the poor cinematography and the cheesy acting of not so famous actors. I personally think this was truly a great horror film because of its simplicity. Today, I think directors go overboard on special affects and goriness that they forget the plot or the whole point of the movie. They end up not having a good theme and it becomes a corny movie instead of a horror movie. Invasion of the Body Snatchers was more than a grade B movie; it is an all time classic horror movie. I think that people should see this movie with an open mind. Since not a lot of time or money was spent on the movie, it lacks acting, props, and special effects. However the plot and dialogue was very strong and it all made sense. I think the movie was very convincing because we can relate to it today. Cloning is very popular now and is practiced all over the world. For all we know, clones could very well take over the world today.

Works Cited
Dirks, Tim. “Invasion of The Body Snatchers (1956).” 1996. 01 October 2007. http://www.filmsite.org/inva.html.

Whitehead, John. “Invasion of the Body Snatchers: A Tale for our Times”. Gadfly Online. 1998. 01 October 2007. http://www.gadflyonline.com/11-26-01/film-snatchers.html.