Body Snatchers (1993)

Robert H. Solo, who had already produced Philip Kaufman's Invasion of the Body Snatchers, wanted another shot at adapting the original Jack Finney novel to the screen. Solo told Fangoria about why he was disappointed with Kaufman's film, despite its positive reception.

'The '78 version wasn't a breakthrough film financially. Critics liked it, but it was aimed at thinking adults, and they don't go to the movies a lot.'

Solo's second attempt to film The Body Snatchers went through several scripts and prospective directors; Stuart Gordon was assigned to direct, until he had to abandon the project to work on 1992's Fortress. The job instead went to Abel Ferrara.

In the press at the time, it was noted that Ferrara was an odd choice, as he was more known for crime thrillers such as Ms. 45 or King of New York, as opposed to Stuart Gordon who, what with having directed Re-Animator and From Beyond, seemed like a much better fit.

The film's makeup effects were handled by the Burman Studio, possibly due to Robert Solo remembering Thomas Burman's impressive work on the 1978 film. Thomas Burman himself was not 'hands on' with the production, only personally supervising some gags.

Barney Burman was credited as supervising on the production, with the team consisting of Rob Burman, Jake Garber, Andrew Kenworthy and Nancy Howe-Kenworthy, Scott Stoddard, Nik Carey, Gregy Polutanovich, Hal Miles, Joseph Coswell, and Mark Killingsworth.

Ferrara's inexperience with directing special effects caused some issues with the Burman Studio, as Thomas Burman remembered. 'Abel didn't have a strong vision of the special effects. I love the guy, ad we didn't fight or argue, but at the same time he didn't have a clear vision of what he wanted from us, so it's hard to say what's going to end up in the finished film. He really wanted to see what we could do and then decide. But that's a problem, because you often find yourself painted into a corner, and effects aren't very flexible.'

This resulted in much of the Burman Studio's work makeup being cut from the final film, such as the deformed facial appliances on performers playing dying pod people. An elaborate appliance was made for the demise of R. Lee Ermey's role as a pod person, but the only trace are thumbnail images on the Burman Studio's archived website.

The Burman Studio team also worked on the scenes where humans shrivelling into dust, and pod people melting away. These were achieved with latex 'skins' that had the air sucked out of them , causing them to collapse on camera.

Unlike the previous two Body Snatchers films, this time the 'birth' of the pod people would be shown in detail. Several different puppets were made, each in a different stage of the pod persons development (some fetus-like, some almost 'fully grown). Burman explained;

'(We made) effects that show what's happening inside the pod as the replicas are developing, which is something that wasn't done in either of the earlier versions. In those, you see the pod replicas from the outside as they're forming, and you see them emerge when they're complete. For the pods themselves, we tried to create something that was ominous and unfamiliar-looking, yet organic. We tried to go in the direction of things that looked like a distortion of something you might find here on Earth, rather than something that screamed 'outer space'.

(I truly hope that someone out there has any more images of the assorted puppets and pod birthing effects from the 1993 Body Snatchers, as according to Rob Burman much of the Burman Studio's archives were lost.)

The pods themselves were designed by the Burman Studio, but there was another problem: the Burman Studio was based in California, while the film was entirely shot on location in Alabama. The pod props had to be constructed on the set by Matt Marich and Star Fields.

The workload for Marich and Fields was massive, as Fields remembered. 'Originally they wanted fifty pods. Then they decided they wanted a hundred, just to fill the trucks. But once we hit a hundred, the producer just said, 'Keep going.'. Tom (Burman) designed the prototype, and they wanted different sizes, so, going off his design, Matt sculpted the rest.'

'We're making about 70 'hero' pods which can be used for people carrying them. We're spending a little more time on these pods. They're going to be dressed with all sorts of mud and moss. The pods turn somewhat translucent in their most mature stage. They grow to 3 or 4 feet. Burman's handling the heavy effects makeup. The pods turn somewhat translucent. We're also making about 75 of the rigid lightweight foam ones becuase when the're harvesting them, they have big nets and so we had to make some light enough to be carried.'

The pod props themselves were made out of an AB urethane-type foam, but the paints were actually dangerous! Marich explained, 'It's a pretty toxic paint that we're using because we wanted to be sure that once we start working in the swamp that it doesn't rub off. Heck of a buzz from it. We had to go home early a couple of days.'

Sources

• Fangoria #118
  
• Cinefantastique Vol. 24 No. 2