So, a remake (2007) of a remake (1993) of a remake (1978) of a film (1956) based on a piece of literature (1954). Not too shabby, I must say, especially considering that the aspect of the original--film, at least--most people remember is the laughably cheese-tastic term "pod people." Seriously, how many other works have been through this many permutations without delving into idiocy? Maybe Arthur Conan Doyle´s "The Lost World?" Some of the superheroes we all know? But to survive over 50 years and spawn four movies? That´s something to be proud of.
The space shuttle Patriot falls from the sky in an unscheduled trip back to Earth. With pieces of the vessel strewn from Washington, D.C., to Dallas, Texas, investigators scramble to figure out what happened. For Washington psychiatrist Carol Bennell (Nicole Kidman), it´s just another day of dealing with abusive spouses and her own fractured family. But when reports start coming in from around the world of a disease affecting people everywhere, she and a small group of unaffected people deduce something more than the flu is happening. In order to find a cure, Bennell must find the one person she knows who has a possible immunization.
Like the Spielberg remake of "War of the Worlds" from a few years ago, "The Invasion" has one massive negative against it before the first reel unspools: it is being compared to earlier versions and to general public perception. How can it not be? The same problems faced the re-imagined versions of "Battlestar Galactica" and "Flash Gordon." The trick is to adhere close enough to the source material without being slavishly devoted to it. Give the situation a unique spin, look at it from a new perspective. Anything to get the audience interested again.
And what "The Invasion" has come up with is using the current political landscape of the world as a road map for the film. Throughout the picture, references to Iraq and Darfur, President Chavez (Venezuela…get with the news), AIDS and anything else we can find in a newspaper today is thrown in. The idea--and this is where the movie will lose most of the potential audience--is that civilization crumbles when we need it the most. That humans are capable of truly horrible things. And just how worried about "status" Americans are when compared to others around the world.
It´s not enough to have a Russian ambassador joke that Russian boots are no longer made in Russia (they´re made in China, in case you´re wondering). No, Bennell must engage the man in conversation about the role of people in a society and what that society owes to its members. We hear and, for the most part, understand the words being uttered even though they feel like just that: only words. For as many roles as Nicole Kidman can play persuasively, there are some she can´t. She can do Virginia Wolff, or an English mother stuck in a haunted home-- hell, even a maiden during the Civil War. But she continually strikes out as a doctor of any kind (see "The Peacekeeper"). There´s something in her delivery of weighty subjects we just don´t believe. Postmodern feminist that she is, the good doctor allows a patient who is terrified of her husband to go back to him. And there´s no way in the world we can buy Kidman as an action star.
To make matters even worse, she can´t stay in her southern-ish accent for any prolonged period of time. It comes and goes from scene to scene--sometimes inside the same scene. There is no logical reason for her to talk like she´s from "Cold Mountain" and then switch to "Days of Thunder." Except, of course, if no one was paying attention.
The actual body of the film--the quest tale, essentially--works just fine. It doesn´t try to make too much sense either in the context of the movie or in any real-world situation. There´s some medical babble between Kidman and onscreen paramour Daniel Craig (playing one of the most unconvincing medical doctors committed to film) about who can be immune to the virus. Chicken pox comes up somewhere in the conversation, a list of drugs, some acronym which stands for something the government of the United States can´t pin down, yet James Bond and the ex-Mrs. Tom Cruise can put together in three minutes. Yeah, okay. And that´s one of the reasons it works: from the crash of Patriot, we´re told to sit back, be quiet and don´t ask any questions.
Like how do the people on the metro know to tell Carol what to do? (They can´t possibly all see she is sweating.) Why doesn´t she stock up on weapons at any opportunity? Why break up a group of four survivors, allowing Ben (Craig) to go off on his own little adventure we never get to see? Why make the US government out to be a bunch of idiots? And why, for the love of good storytelling, lurch into an epilogue without filling in the rest of the story?
I´ve done little else but rail against "The Invasion" from the very beginning of this review. I may be painting the wrong picture. It´s not blowing anyone´s socks off nor is it reinventing the genre. What it turns out to be is enjoyable. A diversion that wants us to think--just not too hard because we´d out-think the plot, I suspect. The premise seems psychologically sound on the surface: take away human emotions and we will live as one, without wars and hate, anger and bigotry. The aliens, for lack of a better word, aren´t necessarily evil; they want to help. But they do it in the complete wrong way.
Much has been made about "The Invasion" being delayed for a year, reshoots, new writers and director and on-set accidents. If there is another version out there-and I strongly suspect there is-it should be seen (much like the two versions of "Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist"). This is the action oriented story; where is the more cerebral one in which there are lengthy discussions about the nature of emotions? Some of the pieces of that film are evident--Carol´s profession, the relatively minor role her ex-husband plays, scenes at a military base and mentions of the president, for example.
"The Invasion" isn´t a rock ´em, sock ´em action spectacle like typical summer blockbusters. It dares us, on some level, to think. Again, not too hard or too deeply . . . just enough to scratch the surface, to get our own problem solving juices flowing. If we take emotion out of the equation, what kind of world would we live in? The film rates a 5.5--certainly not a disaster, but ultimately disappointing because there is a more meaningful plot just under the surface. No one knew how to find it.