OLIVIA MARNE
“Twilight” will be, financially-speaking, the gift that keeps on giving but Stephenie Meyer’s bank balance will also be fattened next year with the addition of a feature film version of “The Host”.
The footage I caught today of the upcoming movie, watched in attendance with author Stephenie Meyer and director Andrew Niccol (“Gattaca”), inspires confidence in this one – perhaps even more so than “Twilight”.
Much like the “Breaking Dawn” footage previewed, the “Host” footage opens with the heroine (Saorise Ronan) awakening, realizing that she’s ‘different’. For starters, Her eyes are of an inhuman colorization, if you will. She’s in a secret facility, where she quickly learns she’s been taken over by some sort of alien being. Diane Kruger’s character provides some exposition, explaining to the young woman -and audience – that most of humanity has been taken over by this alien presence and that the reason she’s in the facility is because she’s a human resistance fighter and they need to somehow extract her memories.
We next see a series of flashback sequences (the camera blurred to recognize the difference between the past and present, much like they do on TV series when presenting the backstory of a character or chronicling a past situation) where Ronan’s character explains that she ‘was’ Melanie Stryder, resistance fighter, who escaped the earliest attacks on Earth. Her father, on the other hand, did not – he took his own life rather than have his body invaded by an alien life-force.
The alien in Melanie’s body informs her that she also has a brother. Melanie isn’t happy about the discovery, fearing her own memories are now being used to help the extra terrestrials that have taken over her body – and the populace.
A later scene shows Melanie, her brother and Max Iron’s character on the run. Soon enough, a scene of Melanie and Iron’s character having a smooch up against a trailer.
In another scene, Melanie is being held captive in a cave in the mountains. William Hurt, playing some sort of gung-ho cowboy, comes in and shoots her captors – presumably wanting to kill her because of the alien that lies within.
The last scene shown was one where humans, caravaning and the like, are on the run down the freeway. A Helicopter – covered in mirrors – hovers above, followed by a series of similar-looking automobiles. One couple decide to crash into a wall, rather than be taken hostage by the authorities.
A cross-between “Red Dawn” and “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”, with an obvious emphasis on teen-romance (to bring in the “Twilight” crowd), “The Host” looks to be a lot of fun. I enjoyed the footage immensely.
