Mars Attacks!

Mars Attacks!
Theatrical release poster.
Directed by	Tim Burton
Produced by	Tim Burton Larry J. Franco Laurie Parker
Written by	Jonathan Gems
Starring	Jack Nicholson Glenn Close Annette Bening Pierce Brosnan Danny DeVito Martin Short Sarah Jessica Parker Jack Black Michael J. Fox Tom Jones Natalie Portman Christina Applegate Rod Steiger Lukas Haas Jim Brown Lisa Marie Sylvia Sidney
Music by	Danny Elfman
Cinematography	Peter Suschitzky
Editing by	Chris Lebenzon
Distributed by	Warner Bros.
Release date(s)	December 13, 1996
Running time	106 min.
Language	English
Budget	$70,000,000 (estimated)
Allmovie profile
IMDb profile

Mars Attacks! is a 1996 black comedy and science fiction movie by Tim Burton based on the popular card series Mars Attacks. It was released in 1996 by Warner Bros.

The film combines the storyline and tone of a B-movie spoof with the budget of a blockbuster movie. It features an ensemble cast, and is highly dependent upon special effects. The soundtrack by Danny Elfman makes extensive use of the theremin (an instrument the composer previously used in Pee-wee's Big Adventure).

The film received mixed reviews from US critics, though it was more popular in Europe. It grossed some $101 million worldwide, and was considered a moderate box office success because of its $70 million cost.

Contents 1 Cast 2 Style and movie references 3 See also 4 References 5 External links

Cast

• Jack Nicholson as President James Dale: US President, husband of Marsha Dale, father of Taffy Dale. Seeks to gain relations with the Martians. He is persuaded to be peaceful by his advisors and is disappointed that the Martians are not peaceful in return. He is later impaled by a Martian flag.
• Jack Nicholson as Art Land: Las Vegas property developer, husband of Barbara Land. Not concerned by the invasion, being more concerned by the well-being of his investors. He is killed during the Las Vegas invasion when his hotel is destroyed with him inside, several stories high.
• Glenn Close as First Lady Marsha Dale: US First Lady, wife of James Dale, mother of Taffy Dale. On her first sight of the Martians, she finds them gross and is fearful of them. In discussions of their evil intentions, she often agrees with General Decker. She is killed or injured by a falling chandelier when the Martians invade the White House.
• Annette Bening as Barbara Land: former alcoholic, wife of Art Land. She likes the Martians at first, but changes her mind after the Martian massacre in the Nevada desert. She escapes with Cindy, Tom, and Byron.
• Pierce Brosnan as Professor Donald Kessler: Chairman of the National Academy of Astronautics, advisor to President, who is in love with Nathalie Lake and thinks the Martians are friendly. Like Nathalie Lake, he is one of the victims of the Martians' experiments. He presumably drowns along with Nathalie after the spacecraft they are in crashes into water.
• Danny DeVito as Rude Gambler: Gambler is a lawyer and attempts to negotiate with the Martians. He is incinerated by a green ray-gun.
• Martin Short as Press Secretary Jerry Ross: White House Press Secretary. Only cares about the President's media image and is very friendly to prostitutes who work near the White House. He possibly dies after having a finger bitten off and being smacked on the head with a bronze statue by the Martian girl.
• Sarah Jessica Parker as Nathalie Lake: Reporter for Today in Fashion, she is Jason Stone's girlfriend and also in love with Donald Kessler. Her head is exchanged with that of her dog in the Martians' experiments. She presumably drowns along with Donald after the spacecraft they are in crashes into water.
• Michael J. Fox as Jason Stone: Reporter for GNN, boyfriend of Nathalie Lake. He is incinerated by a green ray-gun off-screen while trying to save Nathalie. His severed hand was later used in the Martians' experiments.
• Rod Steiger as Gen. Decker: US Army General. Does not trust the Martians at all, assumes the worst of their intentions, and wants to destroy them. He is ultimately shrunk to a tiny size by the Martian leader and crushed.
• Tom Jones as Himself: Famous real-life singer, who assists Byron, Cindy, and Barbara during their escape from Las Vegas.
• Lukas Haas as Richie Norris: Lives in Perkinsville, Kansas. Family outcast. Saves the world by discovering the Martians' weakness.
• Natalie Portman as Taffy Dale: US First Daughter, daughter of James and Marsha Dale. She survives the invasion and appears to develop a crush on Richie.
• Jim Brown as Byron Williams: Former heavyweight champion who organizes a fight with the Martians in order to distract them while Tom, Barbara, and Cindy escape. While it initially appears he was overwhelmed by the many Martians, he makes a heroic appearance in the end, alive and well.
• Lisa Marie as Martian Girl: A Martian disguised as a young woman, who tricks Jerry Ross into letting her into the White House. She is shot dead by several Secret Service agents while holding the president hostage.
• Sylvia Sidney as Florence Norris: Lives in Perkinsville. A family outcast who helps her grandson Richie save the world with her music, which kills the Martians. This was Sidney's final role in a feature film. She was 86 at the time.
• Christina Applegate as Sharona: Billy Glen's girlfriend, lives in the trailer diagonally across from the Norris's. After Billy Glen is killed, she finds a new boyfriend. Later, however, the two are incinerated by a green ray-gun while they are having sex.
• Joe Don Baker as Mr. Norris: Father of Billy Glen and Richie. Very proud of Billy Glen. Killed or injured along with his wife when a Martian in a robot smashes their trailer into another.
• Pam Grier as Louise Williams: Ex-wife of Byron, mother of Cedric and Neville. Washington D.C. bus driver. May have remarried Byron after the events of the film.
• Paul Winfield as Lt. Gen. Casey: U.S. Army Lieutenant General who thinks the Martians are most likely peaceful. Sent to greet their Ambassador in Nevada. He is the first human victim to die at the hands of a Martian.
• Jack Black as Billy Glen Norris: U.S. Army Soldier, volunteers for Martian detail in the Nevada desert. Brother of Richie Norris. He is incinerated by a red ray-gun while trying to surrender to a Martian.
• Brian Haley as Secret Service Agent Mitch: Bodyguard of President Dale, who remains with him throughout the film. He is incinerated by a green ray-gun while defending President Dale.
• O-Lan Jones as Sue Ann Norris: Mother of Billy Glen and Richie. Wife of Mr. Norris. She is killed or injured along with her husband when a Martian in a robot smashes their trailer into another.
• Ray J as Cedric Williams: Brother of Neville, son of Byron and Louise, helps protect the President.
• Brandon Hammond as Neville Williams: Brother of Cedric, son of Byron and Louise, saves the President's life.
• Jerzy Skolimowski as Dr. Zeigler: Inventor of the translator device. Present in Nevada the during first contact between Martians and humans. His fate is unknown, but it is likely that he is killed by the Martians.
• Janice Rivera as Cindy: Waitress at a Las Vegas casino. Escapes with Tom Jones, Barbara, and Byron.
• Barbet Schroeder as Maurice, the French President: President of France, who is unaware of the invasion and attempts to negotiate with the Martians, believing he has reached an agreement until the Martians begin shooting their ray-guns in the same room with him. He is incinerated by a red ray-gun off-screen.
• Frank Welker as Martians who invade the Earth and destroy humans, the leader wears a purple cape and the ambassador wears a red cape. Eventually, they are all killed by music that caused their brains to explode; some were killed with human-developed weapons or Martian weapons before the effects of the music on them was discovered.

Style and movie references

This article or section may contain original research or unverified claims. Please improve the article by adding references. See the talk page for details. (September 2007)

As with other Burton movies, the subject under scrutiny is not only the present, but the mass culture of his own suburban childhood. Although nominally set in the present day, the film contains numerous anachronistic references to the style of the 1950s science fiction B-movies, of which it is a parody. The film's tone is similar to that of the trading card series, depicting exaggerated comic violence with an intense and often garish color scheme.

The plot is fairly simple but contains unusual variations on the normal Martian invasion movie. The premise is that Martians have arrived at Earth and the President of the United States, James Dale, (played by Jack Nicholson) seeks to gain maximum public relations points by establishing a friendly relationship with them. The Martians, however, reject these overtures and proceed to wreak havoc with their spectacular red and green death-ray guns, which reduce their victims to red or green bone. The Martians also toy with Professor Kessler's assumption that advanced civilizations are peace-loving by repeatedly arranging meetings for peace treaties and then massacring the humans involved. They use this tactic to wipe out both the United States Congress and the National Assembly of France.

As in the film The War of the Worlds, a simple weapon is ultimately found to counter the alien invaders: in this instance it is the playing of a piece of yodeling music, "Indian Love Call" by Slim Whitman, which causes Martian brains to explode. This is similar to another parody of B-movies, Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, in which the killer tomatoes were defeated by playing the song "Puberty Love" by Ronny Desmond. Similarly, in the third season episode of the The Twilight Zone entitled Hocus-Pocus and Frisby (airdate April 13, 1962), a badly played harmonica allows the protagonist to escape his alien captors.

There is a brief clip of Godzilla destroying Tokyo (from Godzilla vs. Biollante) played aboard the Martian ship. Like many products of Earth, the Martians question what it is they are seeing.

The film is considered to have some similarities with Independence Day, an alien-invasion movie released a few months earlier by rival studio 20th Century Fox, in that Mars Attacks plays primarily for comedy everything that Independence Day plays with relative seriousness. For example, where Independence Day has a sequence of epic-style destruction of major cities across the world, Mars Attacks! has the aliens using Easter Island as a bowling alley, carving their own faces in Mount Rushmore, toppling the Washington Monument onto boy scouts in Washington, D.C. (a deliberate parody of a similar scene in the 1956 B-movie Earth vs. the Flying Saucers), and melting the Eiffel Tower, the Taj Mahal, and Big Ben. Other similarities include:

• Enthusiastic humans who eagerly await the aliens' arrival, only to be mercilessly slaughtered in the initial attack;
• Scenes of frantic escapes from the White House;
• The death of the First Lady (in this case, Marsha Dale (Glenn Close) is crushed under Nancy Reagan's chandelier during the President's chaotic escape from the White House);
• The U.S. President's reluctance to use a nuclear weapon against the invaders and agreeing to do so after much destruction and persuasion. In both cases, the weapon proves futile.

Since Mars Attacks! was released only a few months after Independence Day, the films were most likely finished close to the same time. The similarities are thus likely to be coincidental.

In a manner similar to that of Peter Sellers in Dr. Strangelove, Nicholson plays more than one role: he plays both the President and a Las Vegas real estate speculator. For the latter role he sports sunglasses, a cowboy hat, and buck teeth that make him almost unrecognizable. Nicholson's double role was the result of a joke with director Tim Burton when Nicholson was cast and Burton had asked Nicholson which role he was interested in, to which Nicholson replied "All of them!". As a result, Burton permitted Nicholson to perform the double role of Art Land and President Dale.

See also

• Alien language
• Mars in fiction
• Science fiction

References

External links

• Mars Attacks! at the Internet Movie Database
• Mars Attacks! official site

v • d • e Tim Burton Feature Films Pee-wee's Big Adventure (1985) • Beetlejuice (1988) • Batman (1989) • Edward Scissorhands (1990) • Batman Returns (1992) • Ed Wood (1994) • Mars Attacks! (1996) • Sleepy Hollow (1999) • Planet of the Apes (2001) • Big Fish (2003) • Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005) • Tim Burton's Corpse Bride (2005) • Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007) • Alice in Wonderland (2010) • Productions The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) • Cabin Boy (1994) • Batman Forever (1995) • James and the Giant Peach (1996) • The World of Stainboy (2000) • 9 (2008) Short Films The Island of Doctor Agor (1971) • Stalk of the Celery (1979) • Vincent (1982) • Frankenweenie (1984)

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