From the future director of Dirty Harry comes the original “body snatcher” movie. You know the story. You’ve seen this or one of its three remakes. I’ve now seen all of them. I saw them in the following order: 3, 4, 2, 1.
Since I grew-up on sci-fi and horror films from the 80s, I am very accustomed to seeing an old aggressive, frantic Kevin McCarthy. It was quite a refreshing change to see a younger aggressive, frantic Kevin McCarthy.
For me, the 1978 version is better, but this film is almost as good. You get gore and better special effects in the remake and not clearly the use of soap suds as pod goo in the original. There is a lot of wild jump to conclusion dialogue that usually turns out to be true instead of long-winded exposition to explain the how and why.
One bit of dated dialogue I enjoyed was “if they’ve taken over the telephone office, we’re dead” because going through an operator is the only way to get communion out of the town. If you enjoyed the remakes or even disliked the remakes, check this one out. It’s highly enjoyable.
Best Line: “Is this an example of your bedside manner, doctor?” “No ma’am, that comes later.” – Wow, that line could be deemed as soft-core porn in the 50s.
