Die Dämonischen

Thematisierung des Nachkriegstraumas sowie einer großen Krise der Individualität. Die Verkörperung der Paranoia in Anbetracht einer offenen und vagen Welt, welche den uns vertrauten Raum ersetzt (Weltraumforschung, Kalter Krieg, Phantombedrohung "von außen"). Die Dämonischen stellt eine popkulturell essbare Metapher über den Untergang der Menschheit sowie den anhaltenden Untergang der Zivilisation dar, wobei sie zeitgleich die allgegenwärtige Vision einer Bedrohung von der anderen Seite mit beinhaltet, die nicht exakter beschrieben werden kann (weil es sich um ein semi-utopisches Machtkonstrukt handelt). Don Siegel hat hier mit zeitgenössischen Mitteln einen exzellenten Science-Fiction-Thriller gedreht, jedoch ohne Übertreibung und Naturalismus der kommenden Jahre. Ein organisch dahinfließender Film ohne brutale Einschübe und auffällige Effekte, der vor allem im Finale atemberaubender Höhen erreicht. Sowohl die Kraft des Bildes als auch die Darbietungen der Hauptcharaktere, all dies ist verstärkt durch die kitschige Originalmusik. Der Eindruck von einer Bedrohung und sowie dem fehlenden sicheren Hafen wird hierdurch lediglich noch verstärkt, im Gegensatz zu Kaufmans späterer Version mit Donald Sutherland. Während dort die "Gefahr" quasi unmotiviert und anonym ist, so benennt Siegls Klassiker dies eindeutig. Trotz der Tatsache, dass dies Bedrohung von den Sternen kommt, befindet sie sich hauptsächlich in uns selbst. In dieser Hinsicht hebt sich diese Schwarz-Weiß-Version von den späteren ab. 90% (19.11.2007)

Natürlich ist die Originalversion auch nach fast sechzig Jahren immer noch eine unerschütterliche klassische Genre, aber für mich persönlich nicht so kalt wie Kaufmans intensiveres Remake. Die Szene im Brutkasten mit den "Hülsen" ist jedoch immer noch äußerst beeindruckend. (13.02.2014)

The US is considered to be the promised land of science fiction, and the golden era of American sci-fi literature in the 1930s and 1940s found its continuation in the film industry, where a number of B-movies emerged in the early 1950s, taking advantage of the contemporary hysteria about flying saucers and alien invasion of Earth. Invasion of the Body Snatchers represents one of the peaks of the genre within these productions, remaining impressive and fully usable even years later. This is because Don Siegel did not focus on effects and sets, which usually become outdated after a few years, but on the paranoia of the protagonist, who realizes before others that he is facing a mortal threat but doesn't know how to stop it. The camera is constantly focused on the main character, capturing his increasing nervousness, fear, pain, and exhaustion. This film is about the despair of a person who knows he is losing his loved ones. Siegel's film has two interpretations - the first, more common one, claims that the film is a depiction of the paranoia of the Cold War era and the fear of advancing communism with its uniformity and massiveness. A minority holds the opinion that Don Siegel simply criticized the decline of traditional American individualism and the emergence of a conformist society, where opinions and value hierarchies are created by mass media and state institutions. Personally, I prefer Philip Kaufman's 1977 remake, which lacks the B-movie patina of the 1950s and has a more balanced and distinctive cast. Overall impression: 75%. (11.09.2014)

Poster tagline: THE NIGHTMARE THAT THREATENED THE WORLD! An incredible intense sci-fi blockbuster that was a generation ahead of its time with its expressive language and lack of naivety. If I had to name a film that best encapsulates the paranoid McCarthy era, in which fear of creeping communism was paramount, I would name two: Clooney's Good Night, and Good Luck and this sci-fi movie that will make you forget the Ed Wood-like dumbness of that era.. Particularly in the second half, the plot builds up fantastically, and the ending? Don Siegel had the balls to leave it open and without a happy ending; unfortunately the studio, Allied Artists, got scared and "softened" the result with forced touches. Still, it doesn't discourage me from giving it a maximum rating, because this movie is unique in the flood of genre-related films. Perhaps because a yet to be famous Sam Peckinpah helped with the script. Kaufman's 1978 remake is also unexpectedly brilliant. (13.12.2012)

Once you start having doubts... It’s as if the disillusionment of film-noir has shifted from the big cities to the suburbs. Like post-war American society, preventively haunted by spies from the East and the atomic bomb. A unified consumerist society. The first major critical success achieved by Peckinpah’s mentor, Don Siegel, is sadistically disturbing due to the fact that it explains nothing. He doesn’t use his depiction of the mood in society for the purpose of making transparent anti-communist agitprop. Instead, he places innocent situations that were surely familiar to Americans at the time, such as backyard barbecues, in a deliberately vague context, thus forcing viewers to figure out for themselves what is wrong, and what is wrong with the viewers themselves. The rational explanation that the characters seek from the start is non-existent. Try explaining fear. Where a psychologist cannot cure an individual, no institution can help society. They are all in on it and anyone who tries to get out of it will be taken as a fool. The confining atmosphere is due in part to the camerawork, which intrudes on the characters’ personal space, and the use of locations that minimise the chance of escape (corridors, narrowing streets). The occasional naïveté and half-baked nature of Invasion of the Body Snatchers is amusing today, but these aspects are not so frequent and conspicuous that they would negatively affect the film’s astonishing momentum, a third of which is derived from the unceasing escape from the situation that people found themselves in at the time. And actually not only then. 85% (19.06.2016)