They Live (Carpenter, 1988): Prince Charles Cinema, 8.45pm
I was reminded of this movie when seeing an extract in Slavoj Zizek's upcoming movie The Pervert's Guide to Ideology. You can hear some of his thoughts on the film in a lecture here. This is a beer and pizza night screening so you get some of both with your ticket.
Chicago Reader review:
'John Carpenter's 1988 SF action-thriller about aliens taking over the
earth through the hypnotic use of TV. The explicit anti-Reagan
satire—the aliens are developers who regard human beings as cattle,
aided by yuppies who are all too willing to cooperate for business
reasons—is strangely undercut and confused by a xenophobic treatment of
the aliens that also makes them virtual stand-ins for the Vietcong.
Carpenter's wit and storytelling craft make this fun and watchable,
although the script takes a number of unfortunate shortcuts, and the
possibilities inherent in the movie's central conceit are explored only
cursorily. All in all, an entertaining (if ideologically incoherent)
response to the valorization of greed in our midst, with lots of Rambo-esque violence thrown in, as well as an unusually protracted slugfest between ex-wrestler Roddy Piper and co-star Keith David.'
Jonathan Rosenbaum
Here is the trailer.
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