This Classic 90s Creature Feature With A Stunning Cast Is Streaming Now
Adolescence is such an awkward time. You’re no longer a child, but you’re certainly not an adult. It’s a transitional period where hormones are raging and our emotions are often out of control. The 1998 teen horror film The Faculty channels the inner angst that many teens feel and translates it to the silver screen in a relatable way. Since the flick observes a release date anniversary this week, there’s no better time to reflect on why The Faculty is still essential 26 years from release.
A strong distrust for authority permeates the narrative.
In addition to its effective onscreen depictions of teen angst, the film’s narrative also conveys the inherent distrust many high school students feel toward adults. It’s natural to question how someone else (especially someone in a different phase of life) could understand your plight. I barely understood myself when I was in high school. So, the suspicion stems from an honest, albeit usually misguided, place.
In the case of The Faculty, the teens’ misgivings about their adult counterparts are more than warranted. A strong ensemble cast brings the paranoid narrative to life with aplomb. Screenwriter Kevin Williamson and director Robert Rodriguez demonstrate a deep understanding of both the adolescent experience and the annals of genre cinema. The result is one of the defining teen sci-fi films of the ‘90s.
The Faculty plays out like this…
The film follows a group of students as they attempt to navigate the daily horrors of high school hell. As if that wasn’t hard enough, these teens are faced with a decidedly different challenge. The faculty members of Herrington High have been acting more than a little unusual of late. It seems they have been taken over by alien beings with designs on using the instructors as host bodies. Now, the pod people are coming for the students. Zeke (Josh Hartnett), Delilah (Jordana Brewster), Stan (Shawn Hatosy), Casey (Elijah Wood), and Stokely (Clea DuVall) will have to sleep with one eye open if they expect to make it out of this ordeal with their humanity intact.
Released amidst a flurry of teen movies, The Faculty could easily have been forgettable. But screenwriter Kevin Williamson has proven time and again that he understands the teenage experience even though he is well beyond his own teen years. The prolific scribe crafts well-rounded and likable teen protagonists worthy of investing in. They anchor the audience to the film and give us a reason to keep watching.
The film is steeped in paranoia
The Faculty channels the paranoid distrust that permeates films like Invasion of the Body Snatchers and translates that to a teenage audience. Like Invasion before it, The Faculty is rife with anti-conformity themes throughout. With the exception of Delilah (Jordana Brewster), all of the core characters are misfits in some way.
Each is struggling to find their way in the high school hierarchy. Casey (Elijah Wood) is nerdy and awkward. Stan (Shawn Hatosy) is an athlete who would rather be an academic. Zeke (Josh Hartnett) is an underachiever afraid of living up to his infinite potential. Stokely (Clea DuVall) is so afraid of blending in that she fuels rumors she’s queer to keep her classmates at arm’s length. Each of the aforementioned characters is going against the grain in one way or another. That helps drive home the film’s message about resisting conformity.
The influence of Invasion of the Body Snatchers
As I mentioned previously, The Faculty takes a level of inspiration from Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Director Robert Rodriguez and screenwriter Williamson make little effort to hide their influences. When Stokely and Casey discuss the sudden behavioral changes manifesting in their educators, Stokely explicitly name-drops Invasion of the Body Snatchers, drawing a parallel to their predicament. She also takes a preemptive stab at those eager to accuse the film of ripping off its biggest source of inspiration. Stokely casually mentions that Jack Finney’s book, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, is actually a carbon copy of Robert A. Heinlein’s novel, The Puppet Masters. That reference drives home the notion that most art is derivative in some way and inadvertently justifies the film’s use of familiar themes.
The literary references are far from the only pop culture nods contained within. In one scene, Delilah refers to Casey as Sigourney Weaver, nodding to another one of the film’s influences. Not to mention, the tendrils that emerge from the otherworldly beings are quite reminiscent of The Thing. None of this should come as a surprise, knowing that screenwriter Kevin Williamson is a student of cinema with a penchant for metatextual references.
Kevin Williamson even worked several thematic references to The Breakfast Club into The Faculty
The references are not exclusively limited to the genre space, however. Williamson’s script also weaves in callbacks to The Breakfast Club, of all films. If you look closely, most of the core characters have a counterpart in The Breakfast Club. Delilah is a similar archetype to Claire (Molly Ringwald). Stan is modeled after Andrew (Emilio Estevez). Zeke is similarly rebellious to Bender (Judd Nelson). And Casey has the kind of nerdy energy Brian (Anthony Michael Hall) brought to the proceedings. The ending even sees a few unexpected pairings like the John Hughes dramedy. However, some might argue that this piece muddles the messaging a bit.
But what about the ending?
Some have said that the ending waters down some of the film’s core messaging about conformity. Zeke joins the football team, Stokely sheds her Goth vibes for a cardigan, and Casey makes a move on the ultra-popular Delilah. Isn’t that conforming? And isn’t that flying in the face of the film’s core message? Well, it’s complicated.
All of the aforementioned characters still maintain a level of their old selves, even after finding their new place in the social hierarchy. Casey is decidedly not a popular jock. He’s still a nerdy photographer. Stokely is wearing a black shirt and a chain necklace along with her lavender cardigan. And Zeke is smoking a cigarette on the football field. Maybe that’s meant to be read as follows: We all eventually mature and evolve. And that’s OK as long as we stay true to who we are. Or, maybe I am reading way too much into a horror film about body-snatching educators. Who knows?
You can stream the film on Paramount+ as of the publication of this post to make up your own mind on the film’s core takeaways.
Categorized:Editorials
