Review: They Live! (1988) · 3:39am Aug 1st, 2015
They Live! is a bit of an enigma for me.
On the one hand, the film's humor and action sequences are really fun, and John Carpenter knows how to direct that stuff expertly.
On the other hand, the screenplay, while being a source for much of the humor, is also horrifically unsubtle in it's message, delivering it with all the grace and subtly of an atomic bomb in a dynamite factory. Let's break it down a bit, shall we?
First, let's deal with the positives, since there are quite a few:
John Carpenter's direction is sharp and witty, fitting the material perfectly, and doing a good job at balancing the action sequences with the quieter scenes, while also infusing the film with a proper sense of paranoia, especially in the second half. His camera work is nice and dynamic, particularly in several tracking shots during the climax. The humor in this film is also quite funny, with the crowing moment being the instantly memorable 'I came here to chew bubblegum and kick ass' line, that has rightfully gone down in the annals of badass boasting as a classic.
The acting is pretty solid all around. We've got the late Roddy Piper delivering a pretty convincing (and appropriately cheesy) performance, and probably setting the golden standard for wrestlers turned actors. He's obviously having a lot of fun in his role, and his character remains likable, even when he goes a bit off the deep end. We've also got Keith David, who is as badass as ever, and his interactions with Piper are organic. On top of that, the two of them have one WICKED one-on-one smack down (all over a pair of sunglasses), and the best part is that, to my knowledge, it's actually them doing all the fighting, which helps make the fight that much more enjoyable.
The rest of the cast is pretty good two, heck, we've even got Kristy Ally there, and she's pretty good. I mean, she doesn't do all that much story wise, but she's good none the less.
The music is pretty neat, feeling a bit like a western with some 80s elements, and it fits the film well.
Now to deal with the negatives. Which really do sink the movie for me.
The moral of the story, that the then current hyper materialist mentality of the late 80s is the product of evil skull aliens (who I swear look like the aliens from Mars Attacks! with less swelling), is delivered with no subtly. Like before, it drives it home over and over and over, and unlike some other elements of the film, it plays it dead straight apparently. And it's not like the screenplay is finely crafted enough to properly get over it's sheer unsubtle. For example, in one scene, a sleazy rich dude who sides with the aliens says that there are no more nations or anything, just the aliens controlling everything, and it's all just business. The problem is, a far, FAR better version of this basic idea (that the conventional ideas of nations and politics have been absorbed by human greed and now exist only as a facsimile for business operations) was given by Ned Beatty's character in Network. The difference is that THAT scene is one of the most fascinating and beautifully written scenes, and Ned Beatty delivers it beautifully. In the case of They Live! however, the scene is rather tacky, and delivered by a guy who looks like a doofus. Any truth in the message is lost in the execution. Heck, at one point the film flat out implies that Ronald Reagan is some sort of evil skull alien. I mean, I understand that not everybody likes Reagan, and I'm not here to write a political critique or anything, but honestly, using Reagan dates the film tremendously, and smacks a sense of self righteous back patting that always ends up happening. If you're gonna imply that the whole US government is run by these creeps, fine, just try to be a bit more subtle in how you do it.
And in the end, that's why I couldn't really enjoy the film. I enjoyed aspects for sure. It's undoubtedly entertaining. It's just that, once you sit down and try to analyze it's message, it kinda falls apart. For one thing, for a film decrying capitalism and materialism, it's rather ironic it was made by people who have benefited by serving up the exact kind of entertainment that this film openly mocks and flat out states is alien brainwashing propaganda. So am I supposed to just turn my brain off and enjoy the cheesy one liners and awesome action? Or am I subliminally being told I'm a complacent unwitting minion of The Man for enjoying that kind of entertainment, and that I'm somehow a bad person for doing so. I'll stop before I go any further. It's entirely possible that I'm putting WAAAAAAAAAY too much thinking into this movie, but when you draw so much attention to your moral (in this movie, money apparently has 'THIS IS YOUR GOD' printed on it for God's sake), and don't even try to be subtle about it, it makes me want to properly analyze it.
I'm gonna give it 3 stars. It's enjoyable yes, and I don't think it's an entire waste of time, but for me, it's message was far too obvious and anvilicious for my tastes, and also rather stale by now. One can only hear about the supposed demonic, all corrupting power of capitalism so many times you know.
Who would have thought that a movie about seeing the core, hidden messages in our everyday enviroment would be unsubtle.
But yeah, as much as I enjoyed They Live, I think it's far from his best. Still good for some good laughs.
3286286 Except I already KNOW this.
I'm not an idiot. This film treats the audience like their ignorant, or at least implies that anybody who simply wants to enjoy the normal television programs or movies or whatever entertainment that's popular, is being a brainwashed drone and is 'sleeping', and that the only solution is violent revolution against the establishment....which never works in the long term.
Haven't seen it myself. I just know it inspired an arc in the webcomic Sequential Art.
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