Cheap The Puppet Masters (DVD) (Donald Sutherland, Eric Thal, Julie Warner) (Stuart Orme) Price

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Customer Reviews of The Puppet Masters

The movie is based on Robert A. Heinlein's SF classic of the same name, which was written at around the same time as Jack Finney's similarly-themed _The Body Snatchers_ (one film adaptation of which, incidentally, also featured Sutherland). The book isn't Heinlein's best work but his worst is at least readable.

Likewise, the movie is mostly watchable. It just doesn't maintain its crackle all the way through. And at this late date, we really need something more impressive than the usual run of 'pod people' to justify making this movie, since Finney's book has already been done _three times_. (And yes, I _do_ want a movie -- and a book -- where somebody asks why the aliens 'hate' us. Was _The Day the Earth Stood Still_ filmed in vain?)

I really wanted to like it, and to some extent I do. I'm just disappointed that even an underwhelming Heinlein work got such a tame screen adaptation.

Good Adaptation of the 1951 Book
I've been apprehensive about watching this movie because of the generally poor reviews. Thus, it has taken me nine years to get around to watching it. I'm glad I did. The book is reasonably faithful to the well-written book by Robert A. Heinlein. There are departures from the book to keep the movie moving along, but the essence of the movie remains faithful to the story.

One of the interesting things about the book and the movie, which some reviewers have pointed to as poor acting, is that Donald Sutherland (as Andrew Nivens) and Eric Thal (as Sam Nivens, Andrew's son) seem to be relatively expressionless. Both characters were described as being rather stoic, nearly emotionless people in Heinlein's book. It's difficult to portray that type of character on the screen because the acting can come across as wooden or emotionless. Eric Thal acted as Sam Nivens was written by Heinlein. I am not sufficiently familiar with Eric Thal to comment on his acting abilities in general, but I reasonably satisfied by his portrayal of Sam. His acting could have been better, but it was acceptable.

One point that I found rather distressing is that in Heinlein's original story, everyone was pretty much running around with minimal clothing by the end of the story to prevent the slugs from hiding in pants or loose underwear, as the slugs were fairly small. The movie minimized this exposure, likely because it might have distracted further from the movie. However, one of society's first reactions in this situation would be to have everyone be nearly nude to prevent slug-ridden people from infiltrating those that were not.

Unfortunately for this movie it came much later than many other movies that may share similar concepts. However, consider that the original novel was published in 1951, and pre-dates the vast majority of movies such as "Invasion of the Body Snatchers", "Alien" and the great host of other alien possession movies. Thus, all these other movies may be derivative from the book "The Puppet Masters", but not the other way around, particularly considering how faithful the movie was to the book.

There have been few movie-makers brave enough to attempt filming a Heinlein book; unfortunate, because Heinlein is one of the most influential science fiction writers of all time. The two recent movies based on Heinlein's books are B-movies (this movie and "Starship Troopers"), but for all their flaws they are a very rare treat for hard-core science fiction fans and for Heinlein fans. I admit I stretched a little to rate this movie four stars, but I own the DVD and I will watch this movie again.

INTERESTING RETELLING OF CLASSIC STORY
Sci fi fans will know that PUPPET MASTERS, based on Robert Heinlein's book, has surfaced twice before in the two INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHER movies. Ironically, Donald Sutherland, who starred in the 80s remake, is in this one, as well. PUPPET MASTERS is different from the BODY SNATCHER in that the ultimate darkness of those two is defeated by an upbeat, man beats the alien ending. This movie also gives us some really frightening looking creatures and some breathtaking action sequences. Sutherland is his usual sturdy self; Eric Thal is quite good as his son; and Julie Warner is very good as the woman scientist. The movie has menace, and while it is not as atmospheric as the SNATCHER movies, it comes across more action oriented, and there's nothing wrong with that, when it is handled this well.