FAQ

They are directing the growth to go where they think will do the most good. Important people, people in convenient situations etc. all so the invasion would take place effectively and efficiently. This plan was so successful that it required a production type dynamic of which we witness in the movie

The director has strongly hinted that the priest is one of the first pod conversions. This is reiterated by the strange point-of-view camera angle we see as the priest looks at the others in the scene, as he swings.

The manager says it's a caper; Matthew proves it's a rat turd. In other words, something that outwardly looks normal, on further examination, proves to be something toxic. It's an early introduction of the film's theme.

When San Francisco Public Health employee, Elizabeth Driscoll (Brooke Adams), complains to fellow employee, field inspector Matthew Bennell (Donald Sutherland), that her boyfriend, dentist Geoffrey Howell (Art Hindle), has somehow changed overnight, becoming emotionally void, Matthew's first suggestion is that Elizabeth speak with his renown psychiatrist friend Dr David Kibner (Leonard Nimoy). However, when more people begin showing up with the same complaint—that friends and spouses are somehow emotionally "different"—and another friend, Jack Bellicec (Jeff Goldblum) and his wife Nancy (Veronica Cartwright), find a partly-formed corpse that strongly resembles Jack, they realize that people are being replicated by alien plant pods that duplicate them while they sleep. But, when Matthew tries to alert the mayor and other authorities, he's advised to simply "get more sleep," and it's getting harder and harder to stay awake.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers is a remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), which was based on a 1955 novel by American science fiction writer Jack Finney. The novel was originally serialized in Colliers Magazine in 1954 and was adapted for this movie by American screenwriter W.D. Richter. Subsequent to this movie, there are two more remakes: Body Snatchers (1993) and The Invasion (2007).

When Elizabeth wakes up late and heads for work, there is an old man in a suit running behind her and being chased. He presumably has been identified by the pod people or caught on to their existence, as a shriek can be faintly heard in the background. According to the director's commentary, that shot was to help develop the audience's sense of unease.

Yes. Kevin McCarthy, who plays Dr. Miles Bennell in the 1956 movie, was asked to appear in that one scene, which was similar to one of his final scenes in the original movie. It should be noted though that the scene is simply a fun nod to the 1956 film and McCarthy is not playing the same character. He is simply listed as "Running man" in the end credits of this film.

The book is Worlds in Collision by Immanuel Velikovsky. The book was published in 1950 and spent 11 years on the New York Times bestseller list. However, the book was highly controversial and was met with overwhelming rejection of its thesis by the scientific community. It's likely that it was included in the movie because Matthew Bennell, like Velikovsky, is largely ignored and dismissed by his peers. More significantly, Velikovsky's thesis involved a (scientifically rejected) process of collisions and interactions between planets, including the seeding of Earth with organic material from space, that influenced the history of the Earth; thus it parallels in some ways the plot of the movie. You can read more here.

They point and shriek in an unwordly sound whenever they detect a human who hasn't yet been converted, which is used apparently to call out to other pod clones in close proximity to detain that person.