Super Movies! The one where capitalist aliens take over the world

 

Title: They Live

What Year?: 1988

Classification: Irreproducible Oddity/ Parody

Rating: That’s Good! (4/4)

 

In planning out this so far modest feature, the entries I’ve had the most pure fun with have been the ones that people wouldn’t normally associate with superheroes or comic books, like Creepshow and Heavy Metal. (I’d add Lady Snowblood, but that would be stretching the definition of “fun”.) So far, however, these exceptions have remained transparent in origin. For this entry, I’m going much further afield with one I’ve had in mind for a very long time. It’s a veritable “classic”, at least of the cult/ camp variety, enough to be effectively above the radar for my other review features, but one whose full history is as yet not widely known or entirely resolved. I present They Live, a famous sci fi/ horror movie based on a minor classic of a short story that just happens to have also been the basis for a comic.

Our story begins with a drifter wandering into a big city, accompanied by the droning of TVs showing advertisements and the deeds of the rich and famous. He finds a piecework job as a construction worker, where he makes friends or at least acquaintances with Frank. He notices strange activities at a church near the construction site, which coincide with TV broadcasts that warn of a sinister and undefined conspiracy, and soon discovers that it is the home of a dissident group. Before it becomes clear who they are fighting against, the lot of them are wiped out by a police raid. In the aftermath, the drifter discovers a box of sunglasses left behind. When he puts them on, he begins seeing hidden messages on TV, billboards, magazines and even money. Then he discovers those behind them, a group of zombie-like creatures that have effective control of the media and the police. With only Frank and a reporter named Holly to turn to, he must find a way to expose the creatures’ plots. Will he win, or is it already too late for humanity?

They Live was a 1988 film by John Carpenter, based on the 1963 story “Eight O’Clock In the Morning” by Ray Nelson. The story had been previously adapted in 1986 for the comic book Alien Encounters, published sporadically from 1981-1987. The comic incarnation, simply titled “Nada” after the main character George Nada, was drawn by artist Bill Wray from a script credited to Nelson. The movie starred the late Roddy Piper as Nada, following the WWF star’s turn in Hell Comes to Frogtown (definitely in the lineup, just not sure where). Keith David of Carpenter’s The Thing costarred as Frank, with Meg Foster as Holly. Piper’s character is identified as Nada in the script and credits, but not named at any point in the movie. Other characters in the original story, including Nada’s girlfriend, are not included or given any close counterpart in the film. The movie was a modest success, earning $13 million against a $3M budget, and went on to much greater popularity through TV and home video. Carpenter openly identified the film as a satire of  “yuppies” and the Reagan administration. In 2018, he publicly denounced the use of images from the film in anti-Semitic memes and other right-wing media.

For my experiences, my first definite recollection of this movie is seeing ads for it when it appeared somewhat regularly on ‘90s TV. I’m pretty sure I still read the story first, in a freaky late 1960s anthology called The Others. (Oddly, it’s also in another anthology on my shelves that I know I purchased earlier.) When I did watch the movie in maybe 2000, it quickly became a favorite, and at some point I picked up a VHS tape I kept in use right until I picked up the 2017 Steelbook release (already jacked up to horrendous prices). I never would have picked between the story and the film, if only because they really are quite different; among other things, the story actually makes the aliens far more malign, complete with a detailed description of their diet. It was only very recently I learned of the comic, and it immediately fascinated me. It is a true bridge between Nelson’s simple prose and the visually rich world of the movie. I had wondered further about the relationship between the comic and the movie, something Carpenter himself seems to have neither confirmed nor downplayed. When I started doing movie reviews, I thought of this one occasionally, but didn’t see a real opening until I started this feature.

For the details of the movie, I find myself hard-pressed to think of anything that its many admirers won’t have already analyzed to death. There’s the shots of the subliminal messages, which don’t greatly improve on the story outside of the chilling inscription “This is your God” on a dollar bill. There’s the creatures themselves, cheerfully bland and even vaguely likable most of the time, but unnervingly focused against any challenge or threat. There’s the egregiously cool soundtrack, composed by Carpenter and Alan Howarth. Then there’s the fine performances, not least from Piper, and the completely surreal dialogue. On that front, I will give special mention to George “Buck” Flowers, possibly underrated as a character even more nameless than Nada who goes from construction worker to a refined collaborator. His baseline is a despicable sort of charm, complaining when his favorite shows are interrupted by a resistance broadcast and later extolling the benefits of selling out. His reactions become defensive and then pleading when confronted by Nada and Frank, with one last burst of cunning.

That brings us to the central question, is this a “comic book” movie? I think the best answer is that the movie owes its better elements to the comic book influence. Several significant moments come closer to the comic than the original story, including the infamous final shot. There are further hints of the comic style in the alternation between the literal black and white view through the sunglasses and the bright and colorful visuals (arguably out of character for Carpenter) that prevail through the rest of the movie. There is the action sequences and violence, surprisingly limited but accentuated by closeups and near-static tableaus that multiply the impact far beyond what is actually shown. Then there is the movie’s somewhat counterintuitive focus on facial expressions and mannerisms, especially in the main scene between Piper and Foster. We see Piper go from action-hero bravado to fear and exhaustion, while Foster looks on almost clinically, her trademark blue eyes as ethereal as the aliens. It may be debated if or how much this reflects the influence of the comic adaptation, but at the very least, it offers a new angle on Carpenter’s visual style (see also Dark Star from way back).

That leaves the “one scene”, and I came as close as I ever have to despair. In all the movie’s wealth of visuals and dialogue, the one that quickly crept up from behind is a scene that I keep almost forgetting about. At the close of the middle act, Nada is hiding out with Frank after showing him the glasses. After returning from an errand, Frank/ Keith looks back out the window, then turns and says with the actor’s usual flawless delivery, “How long have they been there?” The scene continues, with enough good lines that I figured out I lost track of which actor says several of the best ones. Finally, Nada gives the only account of his backstory, of his relationship with his religious father. He recounts that his parent “changed… turned mean,” and proceeds to a truly terrifying account of having a razor held to his throat. Piper comes close to falsetto as he repeats the words of his younger self, “`Daddy, please…’” Then he becomes composed again, and says, “There’s gonna be Hell to pay. ‘Cause I’m not Daddy’s little boy no more.” It’s a superb moment that goes against the usual reputation of the actor, the character and the movie, but still what we should have expected from a storyteller as accomplished as Carpenter.

In closing, the best I can offer is my on-and-off thoughts on the politics of the movie. What I find striking in hindsight is that even when I first saw this movie, I didn’t take it as an indictment of anyone I was for or against. If anything, what stood out to me was that it offered a reasonably positive view of religion, which I suspect is a major reason it has continued to resonate in conservative circles. The harder, darker lesson is that the powers that be of the ‘80s were, even more than other places and times, amoral and apolitical. The “yuppies” Carpenter openly satirized might have been Regan voters or self-styled liberals, but they were still united in their self-centeredness and active indifference. I can’t credit that this was lost on him, especially judging from Flowers’ longest monologue: “They own everything… There’s no good guys any more.” The real moral of this story remains that the aliens have already landed, and they are us.

I have another link list. I recommend first and foremost Lit Reactor for an impressive comparison of the movie, the short story and the comic. A close second is Dangerous Minds, with honorable mention for Page To Screen for a rundown of the original story.