The Invasion(2007)

PG-13
1h 39m
- Sci-Fi
- Thriller

Release Date: Aug 17, 2007 | Wide

As a Washington, D.C. psychiatrist unearths the origin of an alien epidemic, she also discovers her son might be the only way it can be stopped.

Official Website

Releases

Original Release | Aug 17, 2007

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Box Office Results

Results

Opening Weekend US & Canada:
$5,951,409
Total US & Canada:
$15,074,191
Total International
$25,096,367
Total Worldwide:
$40,170,558

Current Showtimes

Your Location or

(U.S. Only)

Director & Top Cast

Oliver Hirschbiegel
Director

Sergey Loznitsa

Technical Specifications

Sound Mix: SDDS,Dolby Digital,DTS

Aspect Ratio: 1.85 : 1

Other Details

Country of Origin: United States,Australia

Language: English,Russian

Summaries

Plot Summary

After the space shuttle Patriot crashes on Earth, a fungus-like alien life-form is discovered on the remaining parts scattered over U.S. territory. Once people come in contact with the organism, it controls them once they enter REM sleep. One of the first people infected is Tucker Kaufman (Jeremy Northam), a CDC director investigating the crash.Tucker's ex-wife, psychiatrist Carol Bennell (Nicole Kidman), begins to feel something is amiss when people seem to have "changed". Her patient Wendy Lenk describes how her husband "is not her husband", and one of her son's friends acts detached and emotionless. At a neighborhood kid's party, Carol's son Oliver discovers a strange life-form. The mothers speculate about whether the organism might be in any way connected to the reports of a fast-spreading flu. Carol takes the organism to her doctor friend Ben Driscoll (Daniel Craig) to have it checked. Meanwhile, Tucker uses the CDC to spread the disease further, disguising the spores as flu inoculations.When Carol drives her son Oliver to his father Tucker, a terrified woman runs through the street screaming, "They are coming!" and then a car kills her. The police are uninterested in taking a report from Carol, who witnessed the accident. Later at a party of Ben's friend Belicec, Carol has a debate with Russian ambassador Yorish. Yorish argues that given the proper circumstances, anyone is capable of any crime or atrocity and that a world without violence would be a world where human beings ceased to be human.Ben and Dr. Stephen Galeano, a biologist, discover how the spore takes over the brain during REM sleep. They also find that people who have had brain-affecting illnesses, such as encephalitis or ADEM, are immune to the spore because their previous illness prevents the spore from "latching on" to the brain matter. Oliver is immune to the spore because he had ADEM as a young child. Carol decides to get her son, who might show a way to a cure, back from Tucker. Before she drives to Tucker's house, she joins Ben's team, who are called to the Belicecs' house in a case of emergency. There they witness Yorish's transformation.When Carol arrives at Tucker's house, he and several colleagues close in on her. He explains that the changed humans, devoid of irrational emotions, are offering a better world and asks her to join them. When Carol resists, he knocks her to the ground and infects her by spurting his saliva on her. She escapes and returns to Ben at the Belicecs' house. They flee when Belicec returns with more transformed people intent on infecting everyone in the house.Galeano and one of his assistants' head to a base outside Baltimore, where they and other scientists attempt to find a cure for the alien virus. Carol and Ben separate to find Oliver, who texts Carol his location, the apartment of Tucker's mother, Joan.Carol makes her way to Joan's home, pretending to be one of the infected who are now in the majority and are systematically raiding the cities in search for the few non-infected humans left. Carol manages to free Oliver but gets caught by her friend's son. While trying to flee, they get spotted by Tucker who pursues them along with the others. Carol and Oliver seek refuge in a pharmacy. Tucker gets in and try to find them, only to get struck on the head by Carol. There she takes an assortment of pills, knowing she and her son are safe as long as she doesn't fall asleep. She sends a message to Ben informing him where to find her.Finally, Ben arrives, but Carol realizes that he, too, has become one of the infected. He tries to seduce her to give in to the new society, and the others join him, but also frankly states that there is no room for people like Oliver who are immune. Carol kills the others by shooting and as for Ben, she shoots him in the leg with a pistol she stole earlier from a transforming police officer, and flees with her son. With the infected closing in on them, Galeano picks them up with an Army helicopter at the last second. They head back to the base, where scientists use Oliver's blood to create a vaccine.One year later, most victims of the infection have been cured, having no memory of the events which took place during their illness. Asked by a reporter if he considers the virus to be under control, Galeano replies that a look at the newspaper headlines should be proof enough that humanity is acting human again. At her home, Carol helps her son to get ready for school, while Ben, now her husband (they wear matching wedding bands), reads the morning newspaper. He expresses his dismay about the violence in the world, as Carol remembers Yorish's remark that a world without violence would be a world where human beings ceased to be human.

Storyline

While returning to Earth, the space shuttle explodes and the fragments bring an alien virus that recodes the human DNA. In Washington, the psychiatrist Carol Bennell observes the modification of the behavior of one of her clients first, then in her former husband and finally in the population in general. Together with her friend Dr. Ben Driscoll the researcher Dr. Stephen Galeano, they discover that the extraterrestrial epidemic affects human beings while sleeping and that her son Ollie, who had chickenpox when he was a baby, is immune to the disease and may save mankind from the outbreak. — Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil The Invasion tells the story of a mysterious epidemic that alters the behavior of human beings. When a Washington D.C. psychiatrist discovers the epidemics origins are extraterrestrial, she must fight to protect her son, who may hold the key to stopping the escalating invasion. — http://theinvasionmovie.warnerbros.com/ When the Space Shuttle disintegrates on re-entry, it spreads a virus that it had acquired on its voyage. Humans seem to become emotionless automatons. For Dr. Carol Bennell, a clinical psychiatrist, she begins to hear of this metamorphosis from her patients who tell her that a loved one is no longer who they once were. She and her friend Dr. Ben Driscoll begin to investigate and she realizes that her ex-husband, Tucker Kaufman, has been infected. Unfortunately, her son Oliver is with him for a weekend visit. She also learns that her son may be the key to ending the epidemic. — garykmcd For Dr. Carol Bennell, a psychiatrist, the first sign that something is wrong comes from the patient who has been seeing her for four years. "My husband is not my husband," she says. Carol prescribes an anti-psychotic, but she'll soon learn the woman's statement was perfectly rational. After Carol drops off her son to visit his father, the thought occurs to her: "My ex-husband is not my ex-husband." More and more, those around her are behaving oddly. They're cold, emotionless. Meanwhile, her romance with Ben Driscoll, a research scientist, reaps unexpected benefits. She asks him to examine a weird substance she found in the neighbors' Halloween candy. What looks like a thin slice of flesh proves not to be some prank, but an alien substance that will be the key to learning why everywhere on Earth people are becoming what they are not. — J. Spurlin