Philip K Dick Movie - Screamers (1995) Based on Story - Second Variety

Story Version Notes
Second Variety was written in 1953 and is so far the earliest published work of Philip K Dick to be converted in a movie. He wrote this in the same year that he wrote Imposter and Paycheck. I'm looking to get back my collection from a friend to re-read this and write it up.

Lisa's Reaction to the Story Version
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Movie Version Notes
Screamers is set in the year 2078, on a far-away mining planet. The Corporation wants to mine an important mineral despite its radiation risks - a faction is fighting against them. Peter Weller plays Hendricksson, the leader of the Corporation forces. This war has been going on for 10 years or more and the only contact with earth is supply ships and virtual reality messages.

The Corporation created killer robots, known as "screamers" which are in essence spinning blade machines that tunnel under the sand, killing anyone without a special bracelet. A faction force braves the screamers to deliver a plea for peace. Hendricksson radios this back to earth and is told to hang tight. But a chance crash of a spaceship bound for another planet has the group realize that they are deliberately being kept out of the loop - the "person" who is giving them orders from Earth is a computer reproduction of a long-dead person.

Hendricksson decides to arrange the peace and bring an end to this false war. He brings along with him Ace Jefferson, played by Andrew Lauer. Ace was the sole survivor of the spaceship crash and is a young, naive soldier. The two trek out to the enemy base, picking up a young refugee boy along the way. It turns out this boy is actually a new form of Screamer, and that the Screamers are actually "breeding" and developing new versions of themselves somewhere underground.

At the enemy base, only 3 people are left alive - two soldiers and a woman, Jessica. They find a new mini-lizard style of Screamer, and one of the soldiers kills the other one claiming he acted like a Screamer too. Now the four remaining people trek back to the Corporation base, only to find IT overrun with the little-boy Screamers. They take out the base with a rocket. The one remaining faction soldier is hurt - and it turns out HE is a Screamer. He slays Ace, the naive soldier from Earth. That only leaves Hendricksson and Jessica, played by Jennifer Rubin.

Hendricksson and Jessica go off to a secret base where an emergency escape pod is stashed. Hendricksson's friend from his base shows up - and is a Screamer. Yet another fight. Now it turns out the escape pod only fits one person and Jessica refuses to go. Hendricksson is forcing her to go when "another Jessica" appears - and now we learn that Jessica is in fact a Screamer, but she fell in love with Hendricksson. She didn't want to go in the pod because she was afraid her "true nature" would revert itself and she'd hurt people on Earth. The two Jessicas in essence kill each other, and Hendricksson goes off alone in the pod.

In a classic Philip K Dick twist, a teddy bear left in the pod somehow, seen in the hands of the Screamer little boy, starts moving on its own as the pod flies through space towards Earth.

Lisa's Reaction to the Movie Version
If you look at this movie as a version of "Aliens", you're missing most of the theme here. The movie isn't about "people fighting robots". It is how people initially create mindless devices to slay other humans. These devices grow on their own from spinning blades, to crawling lizards, to simple happy children, to "help me!" heart-string-tugging hurt soldiers, all the way up to Shakespeare-quoting men and real-love-feeling women.

When the robots reach that human-like point of development, they no longer simply focus on breeding and staying alive as a collective race. Now the ROBOTS start slaying each other for reasons that humans find all to understandable - love and personal desire.

Yes, there's the tension as you keep thinking "what will the NEXT robot look like". You begin to examine the actions of each character, wondering if he or she is a robot too. The line between "real human" and "mechanical device" becomes blurred. At one point Hendricksson grabs Jessica's hand and slices it open on purpose, to see if she really is human or a robot. She bleeds, and he apologizes profusely - leading to them falling in love. But of course the blood was fake - this was merely the next evolution in the robot progression. And it brings to mind the classic line, "If you prick us, do we not bleed?" (Shakespeare, Merchant of Venice, Act 3, Scene 1). Given the large number of other Shakespeare quotes in the movie, the symbolism was quite apt.

It was impressive that Hendricksson treats the people around him with casual disregard many times - but the robots are showing emotions. The humans are often brusque and untalkative - but the robots make insightful comments drawing from Shakespeare and other great thinkers. It is almost the robots who are the better race here - they have managed to wipe all the humans off the planet, evolved themselves to higher levels, and have their sights set on Planet Earth next. In that sense, Screamers is VERY much like Blade Runner, making us really think about how we would differ from intelligent robots - and if we would measure up. A movie to watch over many times.

Buy Screamers DVD from Amazon.com
Second Variety from Amazon.com

Philip K Dick Stories Made Into Movies
A Scanner Darkly
Barjo
Blade Runner
Imposter
Minority Report
Next
Paycheck
Screamers
Total Recall

Philip K Dick Homepage