Forgotten Villains: Dr David Kibner Invasion of the Body Snatchers

By Owen Quinn author of the Time Warriors and Zombie Blues

Photos copyright United Artists

I was recently made aware of just how many movies and television shows the younger generation have never heard of, never mind seen. So to that end, we look back at some characters you really need to see before you kick the bucket.

Humanity always wants to improve on what has gone before hence the old adage if a sequel/remake is better than the original. Very few remakes/sequels fall into that category bar for example Aliens, Temple of Doom and Every Which Way You Can.

In 1978 a remake of the classic 1956 Kevin McCarthy version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers hit the big screen. It featured an all star cast with Donald Sutherland as Matthew Bennet, Veronica Cartwright as Nancy, Jeff Goldblum as Jack, Brooke Adams as Elizabeth and Leonard Nimoy as therapist Dr David Kibner.

This time instead of a small town, we see the invasion as it hits a big city. McCarthy makes a cameo which has become part of pop culture as he throws himself on the bonnet of Donald Sutherland’s car yelling, “They’re coming! You’re next! You’re in danger!” before being run over by a car. The trick with any remake or sequel is to make it different from the original without straying too far from the parent material. Writer W.D. Richtter manages to make this version its own entity while retaining all that makes the original unique. With the evolution of special effects, we get a better view of the pod people as they are born.

While everyone knows the scene with the dog with the human head (homaged in Mars Attacks), this time the pod people are birthed against the sound effect of a foetal heartbeat which makes the audience uncomfortable. Many of us hear this sound when we go for a check up while pregnant so there is an immediate and total association with happiness and smiles. A baby’s heartbeat symbolises hope for the future, a new chapter and the love of a family. But the same sound put against an alien growing into a full bodied person while killing all that their host is, is unsettling to say the least. There is no love, no emotion, just an empty replicant that does not know what it is to be human despite stealing our forms. There is no continuation or family get togethers or the promise of that first birthday party. The things that steal our faces are cuckoos that live in a world without love, no hate, no emotion at all. That isn’t life; that is damnation.

With one exception; this time round Richter takes the theme of being replaced to a new level in the character of Dr David Kibner played by Star Trek’s very own the late and great Leonard Nimoy. However, I have never forgiven him for not turning up to a convention in Malahide years ago with Majel Barrett Roddenberry. I never did get the chance to meet him again. But I digress.

Kibner is a famous therapist kind of like Dr Phil. Elizabeth is convinced her boyfriend Geoffrey is not the same person and has seen him meeting strangers in the city. She confides in Matthew and he takes her to the book launch of his friend Kibner’s latest work. There they witness a woman freaking out badly because she believes that her husband is not the man she married which immediately draws Elizabeth’s attention. Kibner calms her by using therapist jargon. The phrase “Will you trust me?” is soon to become a huge no no in this movie. Kibner does the same with Elizabeth equating her fears to simply wanting out of a failing relationship with a man she no longer recognises. He reveals that he has been hearing stories like this from his patients all week which links into the theme that we don’t look out for each other any more and we don’t know what is happening in the world. This movie is before internet yet it is the same today with heads in phones. Kibner smiles and laughs showing emotion like any of us but what Richter does very cleverly is dupe us into the same wave of paranoia the characters are feeling.

Jack and nanacy own a massage parlour with mud baths etc. Nancy finds a duplicate Jack and calls David who flees to find Elizabeth. We are on a single continuous timeline now since the book launch so in the audience’s head there are no gaps in time. Matthew tells Jack to call David and get him over to the parlour which he does. Finding Elizabeth almost converted, Matthew rescues her putting her duplicate in a closet. Returning to the parlour he finds David with Jack and Nancy. The body has gone but Nancy finds an open window and sees a garbage truck outside.

With David’s scare jump we conclude immediately that he has somehow disposed of the body and one of the pod people now. His tone is flat and face impassive so we revel in sussing out one of the movie’s twists. However when Matthew calls the police and brings them to Elizabeth’s house to show them her dead duplicate, it too has gone. Looking foolish and deluded in front of the cops, David sits on the edge of the bed and suddenly he is acting just like any despairing friend would. He puts his head in his hand rubbing his forehead and raises his voice to try and get Matthew to see reason. He gets angry and reasons with the cops to leave it for them to resolve using his fame as a therapist. This is not the action of a pod person but obviously a real human. Of course, you keep expecting that emotionless Vulcan Spock to raise an eyebrow and surface in Kibner’s pod person.

Morning arrives and Kibner is obviously exhausted and still trying to reason with Matthew and the others over what they claim they saw to find a logical explanation. Kibner does his best to deter them from their people are seemingly mad being duplicated theories. Nancy challenges as to why he is trying to convince them they are insane but he answers he is simply trying to help them. Finally a weary Kibner agrees to help them as he has known Matthew too long so believes his story. He agrees to use his influence with the authorities including the Mayor and leaves to start the ball rolling.

But we get a kick in the balls as Kibner gets into a car with Elizabeth’s turned Geoffrey and another man and simply says, “The sooner the better.”

Kibner has been a pod person all along so why is he different from the others displaying apparent emotion?

That is where Richter works magic. Look at the 80s where counsellors were treated like gods and the likes of Dr Phil upon whom people hang on to and believe every word they utter. A few years later Jean Luc Picard’s Enterprise would have a shrink in the form of Troi. People are so flawed that they will live and die by their shrink’s advice. We know now the hysterical woman at the party was definitely taken home and replaced there and then. So if you were a pod person and let’s assume Kibner was one of thr first, then using that intimate knowledge to manipulate people is a sound plan. He can deliver you to your death with a “Will you trust me?” It is simple, it is scary but speaks volumes about humanity and their needs and desires. They cannot find in themselves what it is to be happy so therapy is one source they turn to. So in order to ensure the aliens duplicate the whole human race it is reasonable that they can copy the expectations we would get from a therapist. Kibner’s words are simply repeated as the alien has his memories and sees a way to subjugate people through their on inadequacies. They can copy our forms so why not our behaviours that they can utilise to complete their plan? At the movie’s climax we see Matthew cutting clippings out of newspapers just as the human Matthew did at the beginning and following his old routines but there is no life there, just soulless repetition. When Matthew and Elizabeth are captured by Kibner he is the typical pod person with no emotions showing. He simply tells them they came from a dying world drifting through space on solar winds adapting on whatever world they land on. To them survival is what drives them. They believe the humans are evolving into a new life form with no need for hate or conflict. This speel comes across to us as something you’d hear a therapist tell a patient about self awareness and evolving as a person. How does “Will you trust me sound now?” it isn’t a hard stretch to imagine the pod people would have some form of leadership. Who else would organise the distribution of pods to other cities and ships around the world?

The notion that Kibner may well be one of the first aliens to take human form could be seen in the way the others look to him for guidance and orders. This is an aspect not seen in the first movie and its inclusion here is designed perfectly to pull the rug from under the audience’s feet. It plays with your expectations as to who apart from the four main characters has been changed. It’s written and performed perfectly by Nimoy in a ballet dance of is he or isn’t he? Given Nimoy’s unique features and association with Spock, it was a genius move to cast him in a movie where humanity is being replaced by emotionless doubles.

The last we see of Kinber is when Matthew locks him in a chamber where all masks are dropped and he screams that alien scream that humans are on the loose. In this age of superhero movies and big features, go back and see a masterclass in how to make an audience doubt themselves in the ultimate game of guess who.