THEY LIVE

Publicity poster for They Live (© John Carpenter/Alive Films/Larry Franco Productions/Universal Pictures/Carolco Pictures Pictures – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

A few months ago I had never heard of the American wrestler/movie star Rowdy Roddy Piper, but then I viewed the hilarious cult sci-fi movie Hell Comes To Frogtown starring him as Sam Hell (click here to read my review of it on Shuker In MovieLand). On 26 June 2020, I watched another sci-fi movie, and he turned out to be the star of that one too.

This latter movie was They Live, directed by John Carpenter and originally released in 1988, which interestingly follows a similar storyline to a movie that I had watched just a couple of days before, The Arrival (click here to read my SIML review of it). Both movies deal with aliens living surreptitiously on Earth and taking control of it without most humans being any the wiser.

In They Live, a small band of humans have discovered that the aliens are subliminally subjugating humanity using a transmission beamed from a TV station, but these humans have invented special sunglasses that when worn reveal the aliens' true form - humanoid bodies but frightening skull-like heads - and expose otherwise-subliminal messages on placards, in books, on TV, etc that order humans to obey, submit, stop thinking, and so forth.

Rowdy's character, a drifter named Nada, joins the resistance but learns very quickly that the aliens have no compunction in obliterating anyone who discovers their secret presence. So he and fellow resistance fighter/friend Frank go on the run together, with a mission to stop the aliens at all cost.

Both They Live and The Arrival examine this theme very efficiently, and both make absorbing viewing, so much so that I would be hard-pressed to choose a favourite among them. Both are certainly well worth viewing, my one qualification being that They Live contains a fight scene between Nada and Frank that is not so much extended as seemingly near-eternal. Indeed, their slugfest goes on for SO long that after watching it for quite some while without any end to it in sight, I seriously began to feel that I could probably have a shave, prepare and eat a meal, and possibly even go out for the day, only to return home that evening and find that they were STLL fisticuffing one another - enough already! Make up and move on, PLEASE!!!

Incidentally, They Live began life as a short story entitled 'Eight O'Clock in the Morning', written by American sci-fi author/cartoonist Radell Faraday 'Ray' Nelson and first published in the November 1963 issue of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. This in turn inspired Nelson to co-write with American painter/cartoonist Bill Wray a second story, 'Nada', which was published in the April 1986 issue of an American sci-fi anthology comic book entitled Alien Encounters. Following this, John Carpenter purchased the rights to both stories, from which They Live was duly conceived – and the rest, as they say, is movie history.

And here is an official trailer for They Live on YouTube, containing this movie's most famous and much-memed scene, in which Nada dons the special sunglasses for the very first time and is shocked to discover a whole new and hitherto entirely-unsuspected real world opening up all around him! Classic!

And to view a complete listing of all of my Shuker In MovieLand blog's other film reviews and articles (each one instantly accessible via a direct clickable link), please click HERE! 

Rowdy Roddy Piper as Nada in They Live, ready to take on the aliens – and win! (© John Carpenter/Alive Films/Larry Franco Productions/Universal Pictures/Carolco Pictures Pictures – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)