The story is a pretty straightforward, classic sci-fi plot: Aliens invade Earth and slowly replace human beings with perfect clones, but without all those pesky emotions. Both Don Siegel's 1956 original and Philip Kaufman's 1978 remake capture the basic freakiness of that concept remarkably well. They just go about it in much different ways. Siegel's version is more fantastical, almost as if it wants to constantly reassure the audience that "what you're watching is just a movie and we want you to be able to sleep tonight," whereas Kaufman pretty much made it his goal to have best friends lock their doors on each other, only agreeing to let the other in following a rigorous questionnaire. There's a grittiness, for lack of a better word, that pervades the updated version, which adds a thoroughly disturbing layer of realism that eludes the original. The casting is pretty dynamite in this version, too, with Donald Sutherland turning out a truly career-defining performance.
