This is my Outside Horror paper that I wrote for Film Study. It is an essay about Invasion of the Body Snatchers(1958). I hope you enjoy it. I think Mr. B did; he gave me 100% on it.

It started--for me, it started--last Thursday, in response to an urgent message      from my nurse, I hurried home from a medical convention I'd been attending.       At first glance, everything looked the same.  It wasn't.  Something evil had      taken possession of the town.

Oooooooo.  Did this come from some crazy religious movie or the beginning of Invasion of the Body Snatchers(1956)? I'll choose the latter, and yes, Regis, that's my final answer.  I should know.  I actually watched the movie.  When I first read the title of this movie, I immediatiely visualized horrific alien creatures stealing the bodies of innocent people.  Oh, how I was wrong!  The film is a combination of symbolism, crazy camera movement, and dramatic acting.  So, sit back, relax, and maybe you'll get the urge to watch the movie after reading my exciting essay.  Enjoy.

After floating around in space for years, these seeds landed on Earth.  They begin to grow into pods and to replicate people exactly,  except without emotion.  Dr. Miles Bennel (Kevin McCarthy) suspects something strange is going on with the people of Santa Mira, California.  Some of his patients claim that their relatives are not who they

say they  are.  His friend Jack Belicec (King Donovan) finds an undetailed body that is similar to his own.  Miles discovers that some of the people of the town have been transformed and are planning  for

the invasion of the world.  Miles tries to flee from the town in a deparate attempt to warn the world.      The archetype theme of this movie is "Man as God".  It is based on good against evil--Miles against the changed "humans".  The pods began to replicate people soon

after Miles left for a medical convention.  (While the cat's away, the mouse will play?)  During his two week absence, as the people began to realize something was wrong, they called out for Dr. Bennel.  To them he was their savior.  He was the one who could help them, but as soon as he came to their aid, many of them did not want his help any more.  They had already been overtaken by the evil that plagued Santa Mira.  When Dr. Bennel realized that something bizarre was occurring, he took it upon himself to save the town--and even the world.  The evil in this picture is the people possessed by the pods.  The pods started as seeds, floating around dormant without a host.  As soon as they landed on Earth they began to prey on the humans of Santa Mira.  They are the "Things without Souls" that created humans without souls.  Dr. Dan Kaufman (Larry Gates) claims that life is much simpler without love and faith.  Is it just a coincidence that these are two out of the three things that the Bible says are most important?  Probably not.  The replicated people defy God; they defy Dr. Bennel.

Jack and Teddy (Carolyn Jones) rushed over to Miles's house after they found that the blank body replicated Jack down to the cut on his hand that he got earlier.  Fearing for Becky Driscoll's (Dana Wynter), his love interest,

safety, Miles ran over to her house to bring her back to his place.  The  next evening, while they were having a cookout, they discovered that four pods had been placed in Miles's patio and were producing a copy of each person's body.  They are afraid of the horror they are witnessing.  Jack wants to destroy

the bodies right away, but Miles orders against it.  They figure out that the bodies must gain

their detail while the people are sleeping.  They also come to the conclusion that almost everyone else in the town has been changed.  Miles immediatily tries to call the F.B.I., but all the phone lines are busy.  Miles attempts to explain the mysterious pods:

"Maybe they're the result of atomic radiation on plant life or animal life.  Some weird alien organism--a mutation of some kind...Whatever it is, whatever intelligence or instinct it is that govern the forming of human flesh and blood out of thin air, is fantastically powerful..."

The operator continuously claims that she cannot reach the F.B.I.  Meanwhile, Teddy and Jack keep an eye on the bubbling pods.  Jack furiously holds a pitchfork to the things ready for anything..  Miles suggests that the things are somehow jamming the phone line and decides that it would be better if Jack and Teddy get to the highway while he and Becky stay so that the people do not suspect that they might know.  The horror scene ends with Miles stabing the creatures with the pitchfork.

"In my practice, I've seen how people have allowed their humanity to drain away.  Only it happened slowly...They didn't seem to mind...All of us--a little bit--we harden our hearts, grow callous.  Only when we have to fight to stay human do we realize how precious it it to us..."  In this movie, we learn how easily we can slip into conformity.  Humans do not like confrontation so we allow society to consume us into one blob of callousness.  In the movie Pycho (1960), we also learn how easily we can slip into traps.  If we loose who we truly are or who we really want to be, we get caught in a cage set up by our environment.

When one compares Body Snatchers to Bride of Frankenstein (1935) we see two extremes. In Bride we see the monster (Boris Karloff) try desperately to be accepted.  In Body Snatchers we see two people try desperately to fight the conformity that had been forced upon them.  One is being rejected by society while the other is rejecting society.

To continue,

click on Becky's

forming double.