Prepare for another Invasion of the Body Snatchers.
The sci-fi classic is being targeted for another remake by Warner Bros., making this the fourth Invasion of the Body Snatchers remake since the 1955 novel The Body Snatchers was first adapted for the big screen in 1956.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the newest remake of The Body Snatchers after 2007’s loose adaptation The Invasion, starring Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig, will be written by horror screenwriter David Leslie Johnson and produced by John Davis of I, Robot and Chronicle. A director has not yet been announced.
Johnson has frequently worked with Warner Bros., recently penning the sequel to New Line’s horror hit The Conjuring. He also wrote the upcoming Conjuring 3 and is working on New Line/Warner Bros.’ Nightmare on Elm Street remake, THR reports.
Invasion of the Body Snatchers, which tells the story of parasitic aliens that control and replace the humans they come into contact with, has a long history of big screen adaptations. The first movie iteration of Jack Finney‘s science-fiction novel was 1956’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers, which director Don Siegel brought to the silver screen merely a year after The Body Snatchers was first published.
But the movie version that most people are familiar with is Philip Kaufman‘s 1978 remake starring Donald Sutherland, Brooke Adams, Veronica Cartwright, Jeff Goldblum, and Leonard Nimoy. That film has since become a sci-fi/horror classic, and remains the most critically-acclaimed adaptation of Invasion of the Body Snatchers today.
There were two more adaptations in the decades that followed — first, Abel Ferrara‘s 1993 Body Snatchers starring Gabrielle Anwar, then 2007’s The Invasion directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel. Both films were met with tepid to negative critical reaction.
Here’s the synopsis of the 1956 Invasion of the Body Snatchers film:
“In Santa Mira, California, Dr. Miles Bennell (Kevin McCarthy) is baffled when all his patients come to him with the same complaint: their loved ones seem to have been replaced by emotionless impostors. Despite others’ dismissive denials, Dr. Bennell, his former girlfriend Becky (Dana Wynter) and his friend Jack (King Donovan) soon discover that the patients’ suspicions are true: an alien species of human duplicates, grown from plant-like pods, is taking over the small town.”
I’m honestly open to another remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers — the five adaptations so far show that it’s a strong, timeless story that can evoke the paranoia and fear in whichever era it’s made. The original premise of the plant-pod aliens may seem like B-movie schlock, but the enduring fear of losing control of your own agency and fate is real.
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