The Invasion is an unfortunate casualty of studio tampering, or when suits in a boardroom decide they (not the artists) know best.

When Warner Bros. Pictures first greenlit this film, Oliver Hirschbiegel, director of the compelling, Academy Award-nominated Downfall, was at the helm. But his cut, a subtle, slow-paced update of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, was deemed too cerebral and mainstream-unfriendly to achieve significant box office success.

So WB and Joel Silver hired the Wachowski Brothers and James McTeigue, collaborators on The Matrix trilogy and V for Vendetta, to revise the film, with an emphasis on intensfiying the action and visual effects.

The dual versions were then edited together (after a long series of screenings for test audiences) and this is the version of The Invasion which has been released to theatres nationwide and around the globe.

The result is a film at war with itself. Oliver Hirschbiegel's aim was to scare the audience by subverting conventional images of family (a father embracing his son becomes an omen of doom because the audience knows the father has been infected by an extraterrestrial disease) and exploring 21st century paranoia over war and disease. The Wachowski Brothers and James McTeigue, however, seem interested only in stunt and pyrotechnic-filled action (for example, a burning car is guided through a city overrun with infected humans by a helicopter above) and stomach-turning alien gore.

Neither approach is wrong. The former slowly-but-surely unnerves with atmosphere and suggestion, not dissimilar to The Shining. The latter, with its taut editing and in-your-face shooting style, provides a potent adrenaline rush. But they don't compliment each other when placed inside a single hour-and-a-half experience. People waiting for a creepy payoff will be disappointed by the metal-crunching and explosion-heavy finale, and those who love the metal-crunching and explosion-heavy finale may be bored by the rather mild-mannered build-up. In their attempt to please everyone, has the studio instead alienated them? I fear so.

And I'm not sure which director to blame for the very ending, which defies belief in its joyful tidiness and abruptness. No lingering unease here, this ending is meant to have you smiling and bouncing out of the theatre.

The cast do their best, but at times seem obviously defeated by the troubled film's production. In the lead role of a Washington, D.C. psychiatrist who senses the menace before the invasion begins in full, Nicole Kidman conveys fear perfectly, but fails to sustain a consistent accent. I wonder, what was the point of giving a D.C. professional a Southern twang? A challenge to the actress, to see if she can hold it from scene-to-scene? If so, she failed.

Daniel Craig fares better. He gives a playful edge and unruly charisma to a rather thin love interest role. I was disappointed to see him disappear for long stretches of time in the film. And to illustrate how long this film's been gestating, he was shooting this when he learned he was cast as James Bond in Casino Royale.

Worst off is Jeffrey Wright, an underrated character actor who deserve more praise for his brilliant performance in Syriana. He tries his very, very best to lend credibility to his dialogue, most of which is fast-paced barrages of faulty science to explain how the alien infection operates (for example, it is triggered by REM sleep), but at times simply can't.

All in all, this isn't a terrible film. From a technical standpoint, it's extremely well-made (the on-location shooting in D.C. and Balitmore is invaluable) and there are fascinating and tense scenes scattered throughout. No, not a terrible film. Rather, a pair of good films crudely cut together (and saddled with an ending so ridiculous and forced it's offensive) in a misguided and desperate attempt to sate the appetites of each and every moviegoer.

This could have turned out well had the studio trusted the artistic vision and respected the audience's intelligence (not everyone needs constant action to remain interested, do they?). As it is... a curious failure I can't recommend, at least not until DVD.

C

I don't think you can 'blame' McTiegue and the Wachowski's for this though. They were told to come in and deliver action sequences, which they did. It wasn't their movie, and adding an artistic flair to it wasn't what they were meant to do. They did their job well, from what most critics are saying. It just obviously doesn't fit. I put all the blame on Silver, who seems like an idiot out to make a quick buck.

A surprisingly creepy and effective thriller that overcomes the bad buzz and actually proves to be quite thrilling and entertaining. The direction was strong overall, although the film did occasionally feel disjointed, and the acting from the two leads was great. Nicole Kidman shined as always, and Daniel Craig was also strong as well. Jeremy Northam is incredibly believable and effective as one of the villains. The weakest link in the cast is Jeffrey Wright, a fantastic actor who seems bored with the material given to him. I found this better than other recent alien-invasion films and would definitely recommend it. It's a slickly made and atmospheric horror film that is one of the summer's most underrated thus far.

B+

Gunslinger's got it.
Because of the way this film was tampered with, it's confused. It goes back and forth from action to social commentary with little success. Although the intellectualism is slightly more subtle and slightly less ridiculous than in V For Vendetta, it still falls flat and is often laughable, and it seems out of place when interspersed with superfluos gore. The gore doesn't work when it's interrupted by commentary.

Despite these faults, the movie was more entertaining than you would think, which can be attributed to Nicole Kidman's charisma. Veronica Cartwright was good in her small role, but the rest of the supporting cast was boring. Daniel Craig was fairly typical and inconsequential....he's too generic to care about. The rest of the cast isn't worth mention.

In a way, this film's inner-conflict parelleled it's own platitude, the grisly part mirroring our indulgent society, and creeping intellectualism a less sinfully savage world. However, this wasn't intentional enough to add to the movie.

For some reason, I still want to give this movie an above average grade...perhaps for being one of the first horror movies in a long while to be creepy without relying on too much violence. And Nicole Kidman is great.

C+...although I should give it lower.

I don't think that Wachowskis are only responsible for adrenaline and German guy for political background of the film. In contrary I think that all the ironical tv news with peace all over the world, Bush and Chavez is the best, has a Wachowski written all over it.
The point of dilemma humans or aliens is to emphasis the degree of connection, between destruction and war, and humanity. It is supposed to be a kinda critic on today's politics and world leaders. It has sound of howl, why do we humans have to make war all the time.
It is naive as lines on beauty pageant contest. That kind of banal and naive you can find in both Matrixes and Vendetta.

It's too true... [calm] ...I apologize, I must have dozed off for a moment there. The Invasion is not an extraordinary movie. It is not a piercing satire of modern reality. It is not even worthy of your attention! I encourage you not to see it. The Invasion is in no way already under way. This is tinfoilhatism at it's worst. You can tell it is a particularily insidious fabrication because this time, the liberals are the invading aliens. Insane. This movie was totally supported by it's production team, the studio, it's PR department, and above all, the corporate media. So there is absolutely no excuse for it's failure other than it's utter ridiculousness. I wasted my time - don't waste yours. I've seen the 1956 version a dozen times in the theatre, and this remake, while not as stinkingly bad as the original, is almost as misguided - if not treasonous. This is a 100% guaranteed candidate for my bottom ten list of 2007. Negative eighteen out of five.... [/calm] ...run!

It was good enough for me. Sure, It was predictible but very atmospheric, creepy and entertaining.

B+

Occasionally it works - mostly with regards to the political commentary the film attempts to weave in - but it's bogged down by a schizophrenic story, some terrible acting, poor writing, and some of the worst editing I've ever seen in a film. It makes Michael Bay films look slow and patient. Any attempt to set an atmosphere and mood is inevitably wrecked by the jarring cuts, overbearing music, and forced action scenes. It's partly due to the reshoots, but I get the sense that the original film wouldn't have been much better. Kidman does her best, but she obviously doesn't believe what she's doing, and no one else is notable. And the way too sunny ending not only doesn't fit into the film, but it completely ruins the spirit of the story as it's been done before. As said, some of the sociopolitical stuff works, but that's about it.

it tried to hard. i liked parts of it but the last 30 minutes were dismal

D+

THE INVASION - 7/10 ( B )

A flawed but gripping and very entertaining thriller. It's nowhere near as horrible as you'd expect from reviews and knowing that it had re-shoots. A large part of the reason it works is because of Nicole Kidman. She is a fascinating actress that makes every role and movie interesting. This could have been boring with another actress in the lead role.

B


I liked it and I really think it's being unfairly bashed. In fact, after having seen the film I had to think about it and its message for a while and that's quite an achievement. It's a weird mix of McTeague's film and Hirschbiegel's film and I'd say that hurt it a lot as with some better and more coherent script, it could have been a really good movies. Now it remains merely decent, but worth a look. Nicole Kidman does her job good as usual. The action and chase scenes sadly never manage to build up any kind of suspense. The whole moral and political implications, though...I thought that worked very well.

B-/C+

Suffers from a really terrible script. It would of worked better if it stayed psychological, because this does not work as a suspenseful thriller at all.

Nicole Kidman is excellent as per usual.

The hell was this? The first 70 minutes are good. As a matter of fact they're damn good. Then the film just kind of rushes to it's concluscion. We have guns show up all of a sudden which completely changes the tone around, the car chase doesn't fit at all, and then the film has the gall to just end suddenly. We've just sat through 70 minutes of a somewhat good movie and everything is explained in a throwaway semi press interview with Jeffery Wright? What the hell happened?

Well of course we know what happened and his name is Joel Silver, a man who was on top of his game not that long ago, and has now proceeded to have two bombs in a row. If he had no tinkered with the original vision this could've been a very good movie. It was shaping up to be that way for most of the running time. Then Silver assumes his audience is bored to death and throws in guns and a car chase and in the process ruining the ending they already had, and came up with one that is just completely and utterly lazy. It's odd really. The things that were reshot to try and liven up the film, ended up being the most boring things in the film.

The only good thing about the ending was Daniel Craig's line, "83 more deaths in Baghdad", which was set up earlier in the film when we saw Kidman's ex's mother watching the US withdraw from Iraq. That means all of the political stuff was added in (or expanded upon) through reshoots. From what I saw, that's the films only benefit from the reshoots.

Just like with the newest Exorcist movie, I'm sure the original director's vision is still out there. I hope one day it makes it's way on to DVD. Knowing Warner Brothers and knowing how this bombed, they'll try to make as much money as possible out of this so I'm pretty sure we'll get it one day. Until then we are stuck with a good movie that was fucked up through editing and the producer which lead to a completely botched ending.

**

I liked it, it certainly goes creepy to action ending just like that.

Once they leave the pharmacy it doesn't loose all ground, but its a very easy and lazy way out with an upbeat ending. Certainly much better than the reviews say.

B

Bump... for another under-appreciated alien invasion movie in the opening week of Skyline.

great idea for a film, but its run time is too short and the end didn't hook me

B