Storyline
Nada, a wanderer without meaning in his life, discovers a pair of sunglasses capable of showing the world the way it truly is. As he walks the streets of Los Angeles, Nada notices that both the media and the government are comprised of subliminal messages meant to keep the population subdued, and that most of the social elite are skull-faced aliens bent on world domination. With this shocking discovery, Nada fights to free humanity from the mind-controlling aliens.
Directors
Cast
Keith David, Kerry Rossall, Jeff Imada, Stratton Leopold, Norman D. Wilson, Matt McColm, Al Leong, Christine Anne Baur, Peter Jason, Robert Grasmere, Norman Howell, George Buck Flower, Gregory J. Barnett, Norman Alden, Susan Barnes, Meg Foster, Sy Richardson, Tommy Morrison, Jeb Stuart Adams, Roddy Piper, Wendy Brainard, Larry Franco, Raymond St. Jacques, Jason Robards III, John Lawrence, Lucille Meredith, Susan Blanchard, Dana Bratton, John F. Goff, Thelma Lee, Rezza Shan, Tom Searle, Vince Inneo, Bob Hudson, Jon Paul Jones, Dennis Michael, Nancy Gee, Claudia Stanlee, Eileen Wesson, Jim Nickerson, Cibby Danyla, Michelle Costello, Jennifer Austin, Michael Forino, Robert V. Greene, Helen Kelly, Gunnar Magg
Trailer
Reviews
80
Los Angeles Times
Has its share of underthought or overwrought moments. The tone keeps shifting radically. It has some silly lines, plot lapses and goofball action scenes. But you can forgive the movie everything because of the sheer nasty pizazz of its central concept. [4 Nov 1988]
75
Chicago Tribune
The looniest movie of the season and also one of the most engaging. [7 Nov 1988]
70
Variety
A fantastically subversive film, a nifty little confection pitting us vs them, the haves vs the have-nots.
70
Carpenter is trying for a satire of advertising and consumerism under late capitalism, and although the film is great fun at first--especially when depicting the world through Nada's glasses--it rarely rises above the intellectual level of a comic book.
70
Village Voice
They Live is, to scramble its most famous line, better at chewing bubblegum than kicking ass.
