THEY LIVE Revisited: Still Live and Kicking

Before Neo from The Matrix put on his black coat and black sunglasses and set out on a crusade against lies and widespread manipulation, back in the 1980s John Nada, the hero of They Live, stepped onto a similar path.

Instead of Reeves’s Cold Breeze over the Mountains (because that is what the Hawaiian name of the star means), we had Roddy Piper. The ex-wrestler, who looked like a lumberjack with the obligatory bad haircut, went down a similar road from the ring to the cinema as Hulk Hogan and showed a comparable level of acting. But he was almost uniquely suited for punching other people in the face.

The film’s director, John Carpenter, is already a legend. A creator of popular cinema (mainly sci-fi and horror) who made several cult classics, several decent or very good films, and had his share of flops. He has not enjoyed major success for years, but his earlier titles still shine and fire up the imagination. If someone has at least a basic grasp of pop culture, they must have heard of such titles as Escape from New York, The Thing, Halloween, or Assault on Precinct 13.

They Live comes from the 1980s, when the creator enjoyed his greatest triumphs, but that title did not become another Carpenter hit. They did not earn big money nor did they help spread the director’s name in the world. To put it bluntly, Carpenter – a respected craftsman hammering out hit after hit – stumbled here. It looked like the film would end up in the dustbin of cinema history alongside the sludge of Troma Studios or Albert Pyun’s bash-fests.

Except that They Live… really still live. Not with the life of Oscar-winning blockbusters, but with the mature life of a film that somehow resists being forgotten and continues to find fans. First of all, They Live remained in the memory of today’s thirty- and forty-somethings. They probably won the most affection among sci-fi fans or omnivorous fans of VHS tapes. TV broadcasts also played their part – usually at later hours, reserved for less ambitious cinema. In many countries They Live also left an indelible mark. It matters that the plot is based on a devilishly simple idea – a story so universal that it can be summed up in two sentences and sticks in the mind.

The unusual status of the film is also evidenced by the fact that some of its hero’s lines could be heard in the legendary computer game Duke Nukem 3D, and the clothing brand OBEY, currently enjoying great success, borrowed its name from Carpenter’s production (incidentally, one wonders how many OBEY cap owners have any idea what that message refers to). So what are They? Is this a slowly hatching cult classic that has been building its stature for years, or a stinker that is still hard to ignore?

The hero of the film is John Nada, a burly drifter from nowhere. He has just appeared in L.A. with a huge travel backpack, looking for work and shelter. He looks like someone who has seen a thing or two. Even though life has not spoiled him, he still believes in America. Everything changes when the hero finds an extraordinary pair of sunglasses. He puts them on and discovers the true face of the world. It turns out that the streets of the city are filled with instructions – invisible to the naked eye – ordering obedience to the system.

Banknotes say: I am your god. Billboards and newspapers with hidden messages program human behavior. One must focus on consumption and reproduction. Switch off imagination. Television also generates a hidden stream of information that formats the perfectly obedient citizen. In addition, it turns out that Earth is under the control of aliens who impersonate humans, practicing silent enslavement through invisible propaganda. On the outside they look like us, but Nada’s glasses reveal the truth: beneath the skin they shine metallically like robots, with large, seemingly mechanical eyes and jaws like titanium clamps. Meanwhile, helpless human individuals unknowingly carry out the plan imposed on them.

Nada experiences a cognitive shock. His value system collapses. But since he is not weak nor sentimental, he decides to solve the problem. In his case, that means ripping it out by the roots. Our working-class hero reaches for a weapon and decides to shoot at everything that is not human.

They Live is a mélange of important messaging and thoroughly nonchalant execution. The film clearly falls into several parts, the earlier ones still containing some elements of seriousness, but the longer the viewing goes on, the more one feels the imagination wither and the focus shift to unimpressive mayhem. Dark and full of dread are the scenes of police units destroying the shantytown of the poor, where Nada finds shelter. Instead of irony, we have here a realistic depiction of the power of the authorities and the fear of ordinary people – cornered and reduced to rubble waiting to be cleared away.

The key scene of sunglasses initiation, where the curtain falls and all the filth of the world reveals itself in full glory, also works quite well. The shots unmasking reality were filmed in black and white, and although they also possess a degree of stylization, they infect the viewer with fear. Except that afterwards begins the film’s liberation section, where the hot-headed Nada with a shotgun decides to preach the truth through salvos of gunfire.

The look of the aliens was likely inspired by cheap 1950s horror films full of cardboard insect mutants. If someone wanted to be afraid of them, they would have to really try. Besides, our further journey with Nada is – on the narrative level – wading through naïveties. The situation is not rescued even by the fact that the film openly embraces a comic-book convention. That too would need to be grounded a bit more solidly so that the viewer’s interest in the whole project does not extinguish.

They Live becomes at a certain point a Rambo-esque comedy, from which the tension generated in the earlier parts of the film evaporates, and the jokes grow increasingly watery. As a result, we watch the finale with a certain weariness. Roddy Piper is no De Niro, so charisma does not crackle from his fingers in a way that could keep us on the edge of our seats. The actor could shout, flex his muscles, and fit perfectly into the 10-minute brawl scene that forms one of the film’s showpieces. The scene itself speaks volumes about the author’s approach, who apparently could not care less about subtlety at the time.

The director decided to enrich They Live with the sight of guys beating each other up in an alley like two sluggish dinosaurs roaring again and again as they slam each other into the ground. It is clear that Piper felt like a fish in water during these sequences. His character is a likeable strongman who possesses certain features of Clint Eastwood or Jesus Christ, but above all constitutes a simple machine built like a cement mixer, created either for sweating on construction sites or for exterminating aliens, throwing out one-liners that creak in your teeth and need to be washed down with beer.

The supporting cast did really well. In the role of the mysterious Holly appeared Meg Foster, whose eyes inspire unease. The actress is already an iconic face of 1980s B-movies and does not disappoint as an enigmatic element with an unknown purpose. Keith David appears as Nada’s only ally, an actor who far surpasses Piper in acting ability. You may know him from several Vietnam War films or from Carpenter’s The Thing. In any case, he is a solid actor who brought a degree of realism here, but on the other hand he looks good with a rifle.

The cinematography, editing, and music are fine. Carpenter is a reliable brand and even if he does not have a big budget, he keeps his films technically in line. Summarizing this sci-fi with its peculiar flavor is not simple. They Live contains all the components of cult cinema: distinctive motifs (hidden messages, a conspiracy against humanity, the glasses of truth), boorish-but-laid-back lines, a hefty dose of gunfire, a hero who sticks in the memory, and a fight scene choreographed as if glimpsed in some dive.

Is that enough for the magic to appear that makes a film weld us to the screen no matter how many times we have seen it? No, but it came close. Is it a good or very good film? No, but it has genuinely good moments. So is it a failure? Not entirely. Many people know, remember, and in some way appreciate the film. Some call it a cult movie. In my opinion, that would be an overstatement. The film falls a bit short of that status. It lacks a bit of punch, decisiveness, or ideas in the second half.

Cult films do not need to be perfect (sometimes quite the opposite is true), but They Live is simply an uneven story in which some elements certainly deserve to be remembered, yet the whole splits apart somewhere between a bizarre gag, a serious message, a monotonous action film, and bombastic satire. It is certainly a story that is at least worth seeing. Although stylized and naïve as hell, it leaves a certain unease. Perhaps because it explains, in a simple way, what we all see outside our windows. The simplicity of the message does not diminish its power or relevance. What is more, I think it is precisely that simplicity that draws new generations to the film.

My fondness for the title is heightened by some underlying suspicion that it was made from the heart and, despite its flaws, is one of the few cinematic fucks thrown in the direction of the hidden architects of our everyday life. They Live is also an unusual creation that entertains, irritates, intrigues, bores, but also inspires and penetrates the brain like subliminal advertising. Not bad for a modest, relatively short (only 90 minutes) film.

Recently the internet exploded with the claim that neo-Nazis believe They Live exposes Jewish domination over the world. Many say it is about reptilian domination. The director reveals that the film was a reaction to the widespread greed of the 1980s, the yuppie cult, and a critique of Reagan-era America. Still others think it is a film about shooting aliens. I, however, recommend checking out online T-shirts depicting Donald Trump as one of Them; a bull’s-eye – not only aesthetically. They live. Cult or not, but undeniably, they live.