“It’s Alive III: Island of the Alive” is a flick that’s full of good (or at least interesting) ideas, but doesn’t manage to do much of anything with any of them.
Rather than the logical conclusion of a trilogy, the movie feels like a trilogy in and of itself, which was then edited down into a feature length movie. It feels like the conversation went something like this:
Warner Brothers: Okay, Mr. Cohen. We’ve asked you here today to get your take on writing a new trilogy of “It’s Alive” movies.
Larry Cohen: All right, well, I think the first one should be a courtroom drama kind of thing. You know, a real Lifetime movie, only the twist is that they’re fighting for the rights of these so-called monster kids. Make it kind of a weeper, you know? Really get on the side of the monsters.
WB: Interesting. And what would part two be?
LC: Well, you see, at the end of the first movie, the dad, let’s call him Stephen, he secures the rights for all these kids to go live on some remote island. So it’s a happy ending. Only now, the people who manufactured the drug that caused all the mutant babies wants the island hushed up, so they send over a hunting expedition to kill off the kids before some kind of connection can be made. But the dad finds out and also goes to the island, and it’s a big stand-off, y’know? Between the kids, and the dad, and the evil drug manufacturer. Lotta conflict and drama and such.
WB: How does it end?
LC: Well, I haven’t worked out all the details yet, but I think dad ends up trapped on the island with his kids. So, you know, semi-happy ending.
WB: Intriguing. Okay, and what’s the third part of the trilogy?
LC: Glad you asked. Well, in that one, Dad becomes a grandpa, which makes him kind of happy. Only the kids seem to be getting sick. So he finds a way to get back to civilization, and bring the kids with, but they get separated somehow. So it’s a monsters on the loose movie, only really they’re trying to explain that they’re sick and need help.
WB: What happens to the dad during this time?
LC: Oh, um… he falls off the boat and ends up in Cuba. Keeps him off the stage until the finale, when the dying monsters hand over the baby to the baby’s Grandma.
WB: Okay, well, that sounds great. Here’s your check.
LC: Um…
WB: Yes?
LC: There’s a slight problem here.
WB: Which is?
LC: This isn’t enough money for a trilogy. It’s barely enough for one movie. And we’re talking about a man-in-suit monster movie.
WB: Okay, well, just make one movie. Maybe you can sort of combine all that stuff you talked about. Take out some of the boring bits…
LC: I’ll see what I can do.
“It’s Alive III: Island of the Alive” fires up with the first big kick start of the trilogy, as a cop helps some woman give birth in the back of the cab. There’s lots of screaming, plenty of gore, and the cop yells out, “It’s one of them!” dramatically as the kiddo is born.
We get a short scene with Perry, the cop who’s been chasing killer babies through three movies now, and then we’re thrust into the courtroom drama.
A lot of talking happens which gets us up to speed – there are five living “babies,” and the father of one of them, Stephen Jarvis, is petitioning the court to keep them alive. I’d go into the drama of the courtroom, but it’s much ado about nothing until Stephen’s son is brought into the courtroom in a cage, which the baby breaks out of.
The baby doesn’t hurt anyone, however, and the kindhearted judge decides to give the babies a remote island where they can live peacefully, doing whatever it is murderous babies do when they have no one to murder.
Stephen, happy with the outcome of the case, heads down to Florida to talk to his ex-wife Ellen and let her know what’s going on. It seems that their marriage fell apart, and she slunk off to where no one knew her name to get away from the notoriety of what happened to them. She’s even taken steps to ensure she can never get pregnant again.
We also get a little hint of exposition that there haven’t been any new babies in two months, and that doctors suspect there won’t be any more. Which Ellen points out is kind of stupid, because clearly the doctors don’t know what caused the creatures in the first place.
The movie kills a few minutes by having Stephen flirt with and then spend a romantic few moments with a lady of the evening, which goes great until she figures out he’s the father of a mutant. Then there’s some screaming. But I guess the good news is she didn’t want her money, so Stephen saved himself a few bucks.
Meanwhile, in what appears to be an entirely different movie, a couple of helicopters land on a remote island, and a bunch of talking occurs. The gist of the talking is this: The head hunter, Cabot, owns the company that manufactured the drug responsible for the killer babies. So he wants to kill off all the kids to prevent any doctors from making some sort of connection between the rubber monsters on the island and his company.
He also makes mention of eventually putting the drug back on the market. So we know he’s evil. Helpful.
At any rate, even giving the guy a name is pointless, because about five minutes after we meet the hunting party, they’re all dead. Including the helicopter pilot, who manages to get into the air before he’s attacked and killed.
Somehow, this causes the helicopter to explode in midair. Maybe the copter had a self-destruct button?
Time passes. Stephen is told he needs to pay his lawyer bill, and also that his lawyer is going to publish a book about the case, whether he participates or not. So he’d be wise to participate.
The book comes out. Stephen’s ex-wife reads it, and throws it into the fireplace about halfway through. It’s wonderfully convenient that she not only has a fireplace in her apartment in Florida, but that it happened to be burning when she was reading the book. A happy coincidence? Forethought? We’ll never know.
What we do know is that Ellen’s friends don’t read, as she goes another five years before someone brings up the book in her presence.
We cut back to Stephen, who is selling shoes to children to make ends meet. This will be important for roughly a second, at which point Perry-the-cop shows up and says that a) it’s been four years now, with no new babies, and b) the judge who sent all the kids to the island is now dead, so a bunch of scientists are going find the kids and run some tests on them.
Of course, they want Perry the monster-hunter and Stephen the dad to come along. Instead of, say, a cadre of ninjas, which on the whole would be a lot more useful.
We’re treated to some banter as Stephen and Perry talk to a handful of scientists about their plans, and then several long scenes on the boat they all take to get to the island of the alive. These scenes take either ten minutes to go by, or about twenty years if your tolerance for randomly sung sea shanties and whining about sunscreen is fairly low.
They all get to the island, and for a movie with the word island in the actual title, there just isn’t a lot of island footage to be seen. The scientists are all knocked off pretty quick, Perry ends up trapped on the island alone, and Stephen ends up on the boat with all of the creatures and a bunch of dead crew.
So he does the only logical thing and, using a map and what appears to be a psychic link with his son, they head to Florida at the behest of the creatures.
This goes great until the monsters run out of crew members to eat. Stephen’s son flings Stephen over the side of the boat to prevent him from becoming dinner, and a few short sequences later Stephen is being imprisoned in Cuba.
This is, of course, where things are supposed to get exciting. The kids crash-land their boat (something we hear about, but never see) and now, of course, the movie should become a story about a city under siege by monsters. But that doesn’t happen.
Here’s what happens instead:
Ellen, who doesn’t feel well for some reason, leaves work and heads home. Only she’s stopped by a person we’ve never seen before, who states that he JUST ran across her husband’s book which, of course, reveals who Ellen is. He threatens to tell all her friends unless she gives him certain favors whenever he commands them.
This uncomfortable subplot is resolved by Ellen throwing up in the guy’s car, then escaping to her apartment. Dude is then slaughtered by a monster on the sidewalk in front of the apartment, which I guess goes unnoticed for a while, because it’s a long time before the cops show up.
Meanwhile, near the ocean, a woman is being beat up and possibly about to be assaulted in a nonconsensual manner, only a monster walks out of the ocean and takes out her attackers. At which point a bunch of cops show up and shoot the monster to death.
Later, we discover that the monster has a rash, which turns out to be measles.
Finally, Stephen is dropped off on the shore by a bunch of Cubans, and he eventually tracks down Ellen, who has been dragged to the roof of the apartment complex by her son.
Then about a billion cops swarm into the complex.
Things begin to resolve themselves. It seems that all the monsters are dying of the measles, and that Ellen’s son really wanted to present Ellen with her grandchild. Instead of, say, giving the kid to Stephen, which would have saved a lot of time and wouldn’t have involved the slaughter of a few dozen innocent people.
Two of the monsters on the roof die from the measles.
Another is shot and killed by cops.
And Stephen and Ellen grab their kid and steal a car.
As they drive away, they note that neither of them have any money, that Ellen is in her nightdress, and that they must talk quietly so as not the wake the baby. Which will probably die at any moment from the measles.
With that, the trilogy that began with a brilliant metaphor and emotional wringer of a first film ends with the dull thud of trying to do too much and accomplishing too little.
Showing posts with label It's Alive. Show all posts
Showing posts with label It's Alive. Show all posts
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
It Lives Again
“Another one’s been born in Seattle.”
Thus ended part one, and here in part two we have the immediate question – will we ever hear about Seattle again? After all, it takes money to go to Seattle and film, and inexpensive horror movies aren’t generally shot anywhere that isn’t the director’s house.
But let’s back up for a moment.
“It Lives Again,” begins at a baby shower, where a young and happy couple, Jody and Gene, are getting gifts and eating cake. Meanwhile, Frank, the dad from “It’s Alive,” is wandering around in the background.
He’s looking a little grey at this point, which is logical. If I had been the father of a kid who had gone on to kill nearly ten people, I’d probably have a few grey hairs as well.
As the party clears out, Frank stays behind, and we learn that both Gene and Jody don’t know who he is, or why he’s there. At which point we get a little recap/update of what’s been going on in the world. It seems that Frank was on the cover of Time magazine, and the subject of a “special program” on CBS. But went unrecognized by a couple dozen party guests. Interesting.
In a move that took me by surprise, the Seattle baby gets a mention – it seems the child was killed at birth.
Frank, it seems, has spent the years since his baby was gunned down traveling across the country and trying to help people who are about to give birth to killer kiddos. In one case he was too late, and in two other cases it was a false alarm.
But Frank is sure that this one is going to be the real deal, so he gives Gene and Jody a phone number and tells them to call him when Jody goes into labor.
At which point Frank goes back to his hotel and calls the doctor he’s working with.
Debates are debated and discussions are had, and a large truck arrives at Frank’s hotel. The truck is a delivery room on wheels, complete with a large steel cage designed to hold mutant spawn.
Unfortunately for Frank, Gene, and Jody, but fortunately for the movie’s plot, Frank is outside looking at the truck when Jody goes into labor, and Gene can’t reach Frank by phone.
So everyone heads to the hospital, including a massive number of police officers.
Gene is separated from Jody – and we’re introduced to a guy who has a name, but it only gets mentioned maybe once. So let’s just call him Old Guy, and we’ll note that he just cannot WAIT to kill this baby.
This will be a running theme for him.
Frank realizes that Gene and Jody must have tried to call him and didn’t get him, and that they also must have gone to the hospital. So he asks one of his doctor buddies to get him a medical bag and a clipboard.
Yes, that’s really his disguise. And using it, he really does walk straight past every police officer in three counties in order to get into the hospital.
Old Guy bumps into Frank, and Frank shows Old Guy his clipboard, which happens to have a gun hidden behind it.
Gang violence must erupt in that county constantly, because the cops are less than worthless.
Frank takes Old Guy hostage, the delivery truck rolls up, and everyone piles in. Frank has Old Guy drive the truck, while Frank keeps Old Guy at gunpoint.
The delivery happens. A doctor is mauled by the new baby. The truck is stopped at the state line, only the truck took a pit stop in a tunnel and now everyone has been piled into a van.
Except Frank. Frank is still in the truck, and moments from being arrested, when Old Guy says to let him go, with the admonishment that Frank belongs in a mental institution, and not in prison.
Oh, and Jody hasn’t been taken off the van, either. No idea why. Maybe they ran out of room in the van?
The new baby is taken to a house out in the hills, where we learn that a) this is not the only baby, b) the other two babies are now parentless, and c) a troop of doctors is looking after and learning about the babies. And also d) they named the kids Adam and Eve, and they should be able to mate 5-6 years.
Gene takes this all in stride.
Jody, meanwhile, ends up at home with her mother, who is none too pleased that her grandchild kills people. Through an elaborate ruse involving a pay phone, a bus, and a Bruce Lee movie, Jody is sequestered off to the house in the hills.
Unfortunately, mom is on to her, and helped the cops put a bug in Jody’s purse.
She will not be well remembered come Christmas, is my guess.
The head cop from the last movie gets a phone call, telling him that they’ve tracked the babies down and it’s his job to kill them. Can you imagine getting that phone call after two years of trying to put something like that behind you? How do you explain that one to your wife?
Meanwhile, over at the hiding place, the gang is all assembled. Jody arrives, but is told that the babies are sleeping and she can see them in the morning. She and Gene head up to their room, and they have a fairly understandable fight where she doesn’t want to be touched and he’s missed her. Though Gene claims he’s really just missed her and not “missed” her.
What I’m saying is that the little one is not getting a brother tonight.
Jody and Gene attempt to go to sleep in separate beds, but Gene just can’t relax, and subsequently heads out to the rather dirty pool located on the compound.
Then things start to fall apart.
One of the less-bright scientists decides to take Adam out of his cage (I thought the babies were sleeping!?) and have him run through a maze, but instead Adam attacks him and takes his keys.
I think we can all see where this is headed.
One scientist is killed in his bed.
Gene, still in the pool, it attacked by Eve. The cops break in and kill her, just in the nick of time.
Adam, meanwhile, is gunned down in the living room.
But Frank locates Gene and Jody’s baby and runs for the hills. This works out great right up until a security guard stops him, the baby panics, and Frank’s story comes to a brutal end.
Gene and Jody are collected and taken to a hospital, and we finally learn just what Old Guy’s deal is. It seems he was the father of the Seattle baby. The baby killed his wife, or so he thinks, and subsequently he gunned the baby down.
And then made it a life mission to kill mutant killer babies. I guess we all have our calling.
Gene and Jody volunteer to go to a house in the middle of nowhere and wait for the baby to come to them.
Then the movie realizes is going to be a little short, so we get a couple of scenes of some whiny brat having her birthday party. The kids seem to all hate the brat quite a bit, so they run off under the auspices of playing “hide-and-seek,” and one tantrum and a bush-beating later, the brat is almost attacked by… a rattlesnake.
One wonders if someone just had footage of a birthday party lying around, and decided to jam it into the film.
Back st Gene and Jody’s new digs, the parents sit and wait and watch their relationship fall apart, while waiting for the baby to arrive. Eventually, a pigeon in the attic leads to an open window, and the baby leaps in.
Mom and dad immediately fall in love with it.
The cops, meanwhile, figure that the open window is a signal that the house is under siege, and they race to the rescue.
Old Guy races in, gun drawn, and the wee one leaps upon his face and starts clawing, forcing Gene to shoot his own kid.
As the movie winds to a close, we see a happy pregnant couple walking down the street. They are stopped by Gene, who wants to talk to them about their baby. Or so he says. It’s possible he wants to talk about the book of Mormon. An experience like this changes a person.
Thus ended part one, and here in part two we have the immediate question – will we ever hear about Seattle again? After all, it takes money to go to Seattle and film, and inexpensive horror movies aren’t generally shot anywhere that isn’t the director’s house.
But let’s back up for a moment.
“It Lives Again,” begins at a baby shower, where a young and happy couple, Jody and Gene, are getting gifts and eating cake. Meanwhile, Frank, the dad from “It’s Alive,” is wandering around in the background.
He’s looking a little grey at this point, which is logical. If I had been the father of a kid who had gone on to kill nearly ten people, I’d probably have a few grey hairs as well.
As the party clears out, Frank stays behind, and we learn that both Gene and Jody don’t know who he is, or why he’s there. At which point we get a little recap/update of what’s been going on in the world. It seems that Frank was on the cover of Time magazine, and the subject of a “special program” on CBS. But went unrecognized by a couple dozen party guests. Interesting.
In a move that took me by surprise, the Seattle baby gets a mention – it seems the child was killed at birth.
Frank, it seems, has spent the years since his baby was gunned down traveling across the country and trying to help people who are about to give birth to killer kiddos. In one case he was too late, and in two other cases it was a false alarm.
But Frank is sure that this one is going to be the real deal, so he gives Gene and Jody a phone number and tells them to call him when Jody goes into labor.
At which point Frank goes back to his hotel and calls the doctor he’s working with.
Debates are debated and discussions are had, and a large truck arrives at Frank’s hotel. The truck is a delivery room on wheels, complete with a large steel cage designed to hold mutant spawn.
Unfortunately for Frank, Gene, and Jody, but fortunately for the movie’s plot, Frank is outside looking at the truck when Jody goes into labor, and Gene can’t reach Frank by phone.
So everyone heads to the hospital, including a massive number of police officers.
Gene is separated from Jody – and we’re introduced to a guy who has a name, but it only gets mentioned maybe once. So let’s just call him Old Guy, and we’ll note that he just cannot WAIT to kill this baby.
This will be a running theme for him.
Frank realizes that Gene and Jody must have tried to call him and didn’t get him, and that they also must have gone to the hospital. So he asks one of his doctor buddies to get him a medical bag and a clipboard.
Yes, that’s really his disguise. And using it, he really does walk straight past every police officer in three counties in order to get into the hospital.
Old Guy bumps into Frank, and Frank shows Old Guy his clipboard, which happens to have a gun hidden behind it.
Gang violence must erupt in that county constantly, because the cops are less than worthless.
Frank takes Old Guy hostage, the delivery truck rolls up, and everyone piles in. Frank has Old Guy drive the truck, while Frank keeps Old Guy at gunpoint.
The delivery happens. A doctor is mauled by the new baby. The truck is stopped at the state line, only the truck took a pit stop in a tunnel and now everyone has been piled into a van.
Except Frank. Frank is still in the truck, and moments from being arrested, when Old Guy says to let him go, with the admonishment that Frank belongs in a mental institution, and not in prison.
Oh, and Jody hasn’t been taken off the van, either. No idea why. Maybe they ran out of room in the van?
The new baby is taken to a house out in the hills, where we learn that a) this is not the only baby, b) the other two babies are now parentless, and c) a troop of doctors is looking after and learning about the babies. And also d) they named the kids Adam and Eve, and they should be able to mate 5-6 years.
Gene takes this all in stride.
Jody, meanwhile, ends up at home with her mother, who is none too pleased that her grandchild kills people. Through an elaborate ruse involving a pay phone, a bus, and a Bruce Lee movie, Jody is sequestered off to the house in the hills.
Unfortunately, mom is on to her, and helped the cops put a bug in Jody’s purse.
She will not be well remembered come Christmas, is my guess.
The head cop from the last movie gets a phone call, telling him that they’ve tracked the babies down and it’s his job to kill them. Can you imagine getting that phone call after two years of trying to put something like that behind you? How do you explain that one to your wife?
Meanwhile, over at the hiding place, the gang is all assembled. Jody arrives, but is told that the babies are sleeping and she can see them in the morning. She and Gene head up to their room, and they have a fairly understandable fight where she doesn’t want to be touched and he’s missed her. Though Gene claims he’s really just missed her and not “missed” her.
What I’m saying is that the little one is not getting a brother tonight.
Jody and Gene attempt to go to sleep in separate beds, but Gene just can’t relax, and subsequently heads out to the rather dirty pool located on the compound.
Then things start to fall apart.
One of the less-bright scientists decides to take Adam out of his cage (I thought the babies were sleeping!?) and have him run through a maze, but instead Adam attacks him and takes his keys.
I think we can all see where this is headed.
One scientist is killed in his bed.
Gene, still in the pool, it attacked by Eve. The cops break in and kill her, just in the nick of time.
Adam, meanwhile, is gunned down in the living room.
But Frank locates Gene and Jody’s baby and runs for the hills. This works out great right up until a security guard stops him, the baby panics, and Frank’s story comes to a brutal end.
Gene and Jody are collected and taken to a hospital, and we finally learn just what Old Guy’s deal is. It seems he was the father of the Seattle baby. The baby killed his wife, or so he thinks, and subsequently he gunned the baby down.
And then made it a life mission to kill mutant killer babies. I guess we all have our calling.
Gene and Jody volunteer to go to a house in the middle of nowhere and wait for the baby to come to them.
Then the movie realizes is going to be a little short, so we get a couple of scenes of some whiny brat having her birthday party. The kids seem to all hate the brat quite a bit, so they run off under the auspices of playing “hide-and-seek,” and one tantrum and a bush-beating later, the brat is almost attacked by… a rattlesnake.
One wonders if someone just had footage of a birthday party lying around, and decided to jam it into the film.
Back st Gene and Jody’s new digs, the parents sit and wait and watch their relationship fall apart, while waiting for the baby to arrive. Eventually, a pigeon in the attic leads to an open window, and the baby leaps in.
Mom and dad immediately fall in love with it.
The cops, meanwhile, figure that the open window is a signal that the house is under siege, and they race to the rescue.
Old Guy races in, gun drawn, and the wee one leaps upon his face and starts clawing, forcing Gene to shoot his own kid.
As the movie winds to a close, we see a happy pregnant couple walking down the street. They are stopped by Gene, who wants to talk to them about their baby. Or so he says. It’s possible he wants to talk about the book of Mormon. An experience like this changes a person.
Friday, April 3, 2009
It’s Alive
Larry Cohen is the kind of filmmaker you just want to go ahead and hug.
Why? Because in an industry that finds talent, then chews them up and spits them out minutes later, Larry is the kind of guy who always seems to find work.
Consider:
He wrote his first screenplay for television in 1958. And he has a writing credit on a film coming out this year, 2009.
Along the way he’s done everything: produced, directed, written for both TV and film.
Most importantly, the man has learned that if you take a monster movie, and put some genuine pathos in it, you can create a classic with a budget of about three dollars.
In this case, the three dollars went into the making of the monster in “It’s Alive,” a creature created by the makeup genius Rick Baker, who also worked on “Star Wars” and “Men in Black,” and a bunch of other movies as well.
The man as won Oscars, is what I’m saying.
Larry is another story, however, and it’s a shame, because “It’s Alive,” which sounds like a gruesome monster movie, is actually a PG-rated film that’s mostly about the difficulties of keeping a family together when your new baby isn’t exactly what you thought it was going to be.
You can tell this movie was made in the 1970s, not only because of the film stock, but because it actually gives you a few minutes to sort out who is who, what is going on, and even gives you a minute or ten to care about these people and events before you are launched into the story.
In this case, the tale begins with Frank and Lenore, a couple of married folks who seem to be closer to 40 than 30. Lenore is very pregnant, and about to give birth, which is making the two of them and their son Chris very happy.
Chris is shuffled off to a friend’s house, and Frank and Lenore head to the hospital. Since it’s the 1970s, Frank is sent to a waiting room, where he sits with a few other fellows. They debate the state of the world together, and all the things wrong with it: too many slugs in the gardens, too much smog in L.A., too many poisons introduced everywhere. A surprisingly Green movie, for the time.
Lenore, meanwhile, is saying things like, “This little guy is going to kill me,” which is indicative that Larry Cohen understands the idea of both humor and foreshadowing.
Out in the hallway, all is well until Frank sees a nurse come stumbling out a door. There’s blood. Lots of blood. (Or rather, plenty of blood for a PG-rated movie made in the 70s. Now it’s less then you’d see on an episode of ER.) He runs into the delivery room and finds his wife screaming “What’s wrong with my baby?”
Which should be obvious, seeing as how there are a bunch of dead doctors and nurses on the floor. Someone also explains that the umbilical cord has been chewed off, but that might just be a matter of unusual medical procedure, rather than an indication that the baby is a hideous monster bent on the destruction of humans.
There are a few muddled, plot-filled minutes where Frank first threatens to sue the hospital over his “stolen” baby, but he eventually concedes that a) the creature that came out of his wife’s womb is deadly, and b) that the baby will need to be shot on sight.
Frank is sent home.
Meanwhile, the baby meets a strangely underdressed woman (lady of the evening? Go-go-girl?) and slaughters her.
Frank then tries to go back to work, in order to get his mind of the fact that his child is a vicious killer baby.
This doesn’t fare too well for Frank, and it’s here that the actual themes of the movie really start to emerge. Frank’s boss tells Frank that Frank should use the three weeks of vacation he accrued. He tells Frank that what happened isn’t Frank’s fault. And he also tells Frank about a fellow co-worker whose child is mentally retarded.
Ultimately, Frank is sent home, and moments later, the boss of the year informs one of his underlings that Frank’s desk needs to be cleared out – because Frank won’t be coming back.
And now, a short pause while I praise the acting skills of John P. Ryan, who plays Frank.
John has a heavy load to carry in this film, because he’s the rock – he’s playing the dad and husband who is slowly crumbling under the stress of what’s happening to him – a powerful sadness that’s coming at him at the time he should be most happy.
The guy nails it. Recut the movie a bit, take out the monster, and give the kid an affliction besides bloodthirstiness, and the man would have been holding a small golden statue at the end of the year.
So here’s to you, John P. Ryan.
On with the show:
Lenore comes home, under the care of various and sundry nurses. This lasts right up until one of them tries to get Lenore’s opinion of the fact that her child just killed another human being. This tips Lenore off that something isn’t right, and she discovers that the nurse is also does some writing “on the side,” and has been tape-recording their conversation.
The pressure mounts. The baby kills a milkman, in what is really the only gory death in the film. There’s an artful shot of blood and milk running down the street, y’see.
Frank is offered a contract that will allow doctors to “examine” the baby, once it is captured or killed, and Frank, who has little by little been trying to distance himself from what is going on, signs over the body rights while noting, “He’s not my child.”
Shortly thereafter, the baby is cornered in a school – Chris’s school.
Chris, meanwhile, has been continuing to stay with the friend of the family – and he’s been keeping Chris in the house, and away from the TV so that the boy won’t find out what’s up with his brother.
The baby escapes from the school by killing a cop.
The baby scenes, by the way, hold a certain fascination, as they are all in “babyvision,” a low-to-the-ground, out of focus view that suggests that it’s not dissimilar in all ways from a regular baby. Both kinds of babies, after all, are small, scared, have trouble focusing, and enjoy the taste of human blood.
But I kid. I have no idea if the baby in this picture drinks human blood. As far as I know, it just kills people. And seeing as how one of them was probably a lady of easy virtue, perhaps it’s just an overly moral baby, rather than an evil one.
I mean, that cop it killed was probably on the take. And I’m sure the milkman probably made sure a few bottles “fell off” the truck every week as well.
The medical staff was, naturally, pro-choice. You see what I mean.
Back to the plot.
Frank goes home, and through a confluence of babyvision and Lenore acting a little odd… oh, and also all the meat is gone from the freezer and six bottles of milk have been consumed… we learn that Lenore is pregnant again.
But I kid. The killer baby is in the house!
Frank locates his gun, eventually tracking down the baby and shooting at it. It runs off, and the police track a trail of blood to the sewers – that’s how it’s been getting around.
The various officers of the law, and Frank, head to the sewers to track the creature.
Frank and crew end up separated from one another – and then it happens: Frank finds his newborn son, who is mewling in pain and obviously scared, and he says, “Shhh… everything is going to be all right.”
Frank picks up the baby in his coat, and heads out of the sewers, where he’s surrounded by policemen with guns. He pleads for them to lock the kid up, not to kill it, and when it looks like triggers are about to be pulled, he flings the baby onto the man who most wants the baby dead.
Both are shot and killed.
A minute later, the movie closes with the rather grim line: “Another one’s been born in Seattle.”
And yet, the second movie is not titled: “It’s Alive II: Battle in Seattle.” But that’s probably because it was written by Larry Cohen, and not a WWE man-soap-opera-scribbler.
Why? Because in an industry that finds talent, then chews them up and spits them out minutes later, Larry is the kind of guy who always seems to find work.
Consider:
He wrote his first screenplay for television in 1958. And he has a writing credit on a film coming out this year, 2009.
Along the way he’s done everything: produced, directed, written for both TV and film.
Most importantly, the man has learned that if you take a monster movie, and put some genuine pathos in it, you can create a classic with a budget of about three dollars.
In this case, the three dollars went into the making of the monster in “It’s Alive,” a creature created by the makeup genius Rick Baker, who also worked on “Star Wars” and “Men in Black,” and a bunch of other movies as well.
The man as won Oscars, is what I’m saying.
Larry is another story, however, and it’s a shame, because “It’s Alive,” which sounds like a gruesome monster movie, is actually a PG-rated film that’s mostly about the difficulties of keeping a family together when your new baby isn’t exactly what you thought it was going to be.
You can tell this movie was made in the 1970s, not only because of the film stock, but because it actually gives you a few minutes to sort out who is who, what is going on, and even gives you a minute or ten to care about these people and events before you are launched into the story.
In this case, the tale begins with Frank and Lenore, a couple of married folks who seem to be closer to 40 than 30. Lenore is very pregnant, and about to give birth, which is making the two of them and their son Chris very happy.
Chris is shuffled off to a friend’s house, and Frank and Lenore head to the hospital. Since it’s the 1970s, Frank is sent to a waiting room, where he sits with a few other fellows. They debate the state of the world together, and all the things wrong with it: too many slugs in the gardens, too much smog in L.A., too many poisons introduced everywhere. A surprisingly Green movie, for the time.
Lenore, meanwhile, is saying things like, “This little guy is going to kill me,” which is indicative that Larry Cohen understands the idea of both humor and foreshadowing.
Out in the hallway, all is well until Frank sees a nurse come stumbling out a door. There’s blood. Lots of blood. (Or rather, plenty of blood for a PG-rated movie made in the 70s. Now it’s less then you’d see on an episode of ER.) He runs into the delivery room and finds his wife screaming “What’s wrong with my baby?”
Which should be obvious, seeing as how there are a bunch of dead doctors and nurses on the floor. Someone also explains that the umbilical cord has been chewed off, but that might just be a matter of unusual medical procedure, rather than an indication that the baby is a hideous monster bent on the destruction of humans.
There are a few muddled, plot-filled minutes where Frank first threatens to sue the hospital over his “stolen” baby, but he eventually concedes that a) the creature that came out of his wife’s womb is deadly, and b) that the baby will need to be shot on sight.
Frank is sent home.
Meanwhile, the baby meets a strangely underdressed woman (lady of the evening? Go-go-girl?) and slaughters her.
Frank then tries to go back to work, in order to get his mind of the fact that his child is a vicious killer baby.
This doesn’t fare too well for Frank, and it’s here that the actual themes of the movie really start to emerge. Frank’s boss tells Frank that Frank should use the three weeks of vacation he accrued. He tells Frank that what happened isn’t Frank’s fault. And he also tells Frank about a fellow co-worker whose child is mentally retarded.
Ultimately, Frank is sent home, and moments later, the boss of the year informs one of his underlings that Frank’s desk needs to be cleared out – because Frank won’t be coming back.
And now, a short pause while I praise the acting skills of John P. Ryan, who plays Frank.
John has a heavy load to carry in this film, because he’s the rock – he’s playing the dad and husband who is slowly crumbling under the stress of what’s happening to him – a powerful sadness that’s coming at him at the time he should be most happy.
The guy nails it. Recut the movie a bit, take out the monster, and give the kid an affliction besides bloodthirstiness, and the man would have been holding a small golden statue at the end of the year.
So here’s to you, John P. Ryan.
On with the show:
Lenore comes home, under the care of various and sundry nurses. This lasts right up until one of them tries to get Lenore’s opinion of the fact that her child just killed another human being. This tips Lenore off that something isn’t right, and she discovers that the nurse is also does some writing “on the side,” and has been tape-recording their conversation.
The pressure mounts. The baby kills a milkman, in what is really the only gory death in the film. There’s an artful shot of blood and milk running down the street, y’see.
Frank is offered a contract that will allow doctors to “examine” the baby, once it is captured or killed, and Frank, who has little by little been trying to distance himself from what is going on, signs over the body rights while noting, “He’s not my child.”
Shortly thereafter, the baby is cornered in a school – Chris’s school.
Chris, meanwhile, has been continuing to stay with the friend of the family – and he’s been keeping Chris in the house, and away from the TV so that the boy won’t find out what’s up with his brother.
The baby escapes from the school by killing a cop.
The baby scenes, by the way, hold a certain fascination, as they are all in “babyvision,” a low-to-the-ground, out of focus view that suggests that it’s not dissimilar in all ways from a regular baby. Both kinds of babies, after all, are small, scared, have trouble focusing, and enjoy the taste of human blood.
But I kid. I have no idea if the baby in this picture drinks human blood. As far as I know, it just kills people. And seeing as how one of them was probably a lady of easy virtue, perhaps it’s just an overly moral baby, rather than an evil one.
I mean, that cop it killed was probably on the take. And I’m sure the milkman probably made sure a few bottles “fell off” the truck every week as well.
The medical staff was, naturally, pro-choice. You see what I mean.
Back to the plot.
Frank goes home, and through a confluence of babyvision and Lenore acting a little odd… oh, and also all the meat is gone from the freezer and six bottles of milk have been consumed… we learn that Lenore is pregnant again.
But I kid. The killer baby is in the house!
Frank locates his gun, eventually tracking down the baby and shooting at it. It runs off, and the police track a trail of blood to the sewers – that’s how it’s been getting around.
The various officers of the law, and Frank, head to the sewers to track the creature.
Frank and crew end up separated from one another – and then it happens: Frank finds his newborn son, who is mewling in pain and obviously scared, and he says, “Shhh… everything is going to be all right.”
Frank picks up the baby in his coat, and heads out of the sewers, where he’s surrounded by policemen with guns. He pleads for them to lock the kid up, not to kill it, and when it looks like triggers are about to be pulled, he flings the baby onto the man who most wants the baby dead.
Both are shot and killed.
A minute later, the movie closes with the rather grim line: “Another one’s been born in Seattle.”
And yet, the second movie is not titled: “It’s Alive II: Battle in Seattle.” But that’s probably because it was written by Larry Cohen, and not a WWE man-soap-opera-scribbler.
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