Bad news
for the NASA Administrator the Space Shuttle has blown up again. But this
time the cause is not foam-fretted tiles, it's alien
hitch-hikers. That's right: aggressive extraterrestrials have bummed a rocket
ride to Earth to take over our planet. It's a familiar theme, indeed, but
there's a silver lining to this interstellar cloud: the invaders are doing it
for your own good.
After years
of enduring war intended to bring the delights of democracy to Iraq, it shouldn't shock and awe you that Hollywood has concocted an
analogous tale in which extraterrestrial
beings traverse the seas of space to save us from "war, poverty, and
rape." Their efforts unreel at your local multiplex as "The
Invasion," a lumpy broth boiled up from "Invasion of the Body
Snatchers," "Night of the Living Dead," and a few other familiar
cinematic carcasses.
The film's
dramatic beginning is tantalizingly macabre. The aliens intelligent, and yet
smaller than a breadbox engineer their arrival by somehow glomming onto the
outside of the Shuttle, thus
provoking an explosion that sends shards of expensive taxpayer hardware to
Earth in a two-thousand-mile long spray of infectious debris. It quickly
becomes apparent that, despite access to about a million terrestrial species,
there's only one species that these microscopic meanies
from space intend to sicken: namely, us. That probably doesn't surprise you
either.
Once
landed, the virulent space invaders set about remaking humanity. The good news
is that they're not here to kill us. The bad news is that they want to improve
us. On the basis of some genuinely hokey molecular biology, the aliens
reprogram our DNA, thereby turning us all into worker bees in a peaceable hive
culture. Externally, everyone looks the same, but emotions are out and group
think is in. No one sweats, no one smiles, and no one has any spring in their
step.
Without
getting into spoilers, suffice it to say that the process of transformation
which only takes a day or so is yucky enough to make you yearn for Ebola.
First you become infected (this usually happens when someone vomits in your
face, a messy mode of reproduction that, thankfully, few higher species on this
planet have adopted). Once exposed, and after you fall asleep, the aliens work
their bioengineering magic, and your body becomes covered in a slimy glaze,
reminiscent of wet doughnuts. This is referred to as "cellular
condensation" (there's a fair amount of bonkers techno-babble in this
film, so it's mumbled quickly to avoid colliding with any expertise that
audience members might have). After a few hours of looking like a Krispy-Kreme, the doughnut complexion fades, and you become
a zombie, with less emotional range than Spock or Data. From
glaze to daze.
It's not
pretty, but at least it's quick. After enough alien infections have taken hold,
a strange thing happens: the world becomes tranquil. The Iraq war ends, President Bush and Hugo Chavez
embrace, Darfur cools, and America
adopts universal health care. Well forget that last
bit: all the top medicos are working on beating the alien virus. Who has time
to worry about heart disease when "Daddy is no longer Daddy."
So the
aliens have brought peace. But at what price?
As it turns
out, that's not terribly important in the context of this film. In fact,
"The Invasion" is not about how to save humanity from a bad lot of
alien pond scum, but rather how to save ever-so-cute Nicole Kidman and her
bucktoothed spawn. The rest of the planet is only an afterthought.
Nonetheless,
somewhere deep in its dramatic folds, this film has a seed of possible truth.
Should we worry about disease from space? Well, any malignant microbes at the
altitude at which the Space Shuttle flies would float to Earth in months or
less. And since they haven't, that's hardly a concern. But
what about meteors from distant worlds possibly even from other star systems?
Some
proponents of the idea known as panspermia argue that
life is indeed spreading throughout the Galaxy via errant rocks. But the
evidence for space infection has, at least so far, failed to convince the
majority of astrobiologists. Recent research by
scientists such as Rocco Mancinelli at the SETI Institute implies that, while
microscopic life could survive a joyride from planet to planet within the solar
system, the million-year trip from another star would thanks to the damaging
effects of radiation sterilize even the hardiest biology.
All of
which means that if you really want universal health care, you'd better not
count on the aliens to wave their molecular wand and make it so.
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