I just re-watched The Hidden...

Cafe Society
1

…the 1987 science fiction thriller written by Jim Kouf (he also wrote Money Monster and Rush hour and created the TV series Grimm). The plot, which seems to owe a lot to Hal Clement’s classic SF novel Needle, is about an alien parasite that takes over people’s bodies and gratifies its wishes, grabbing money, fast cars, and anything that it wants. When it wears out one host, it moves onto a another. The parasite is pursued by a similar alien policeman who wants to stop its narcissistic, egotistic rampage*. At the end, the parasite slithers into the body of someone running for president, clearly hoping for maximum opportunity.
I think I finally understand Donald Trump.
Where’s Agent Gallagher when you need him?

*This film marks the first time Kyle McLachlan plays a weird, off-beat FBI agent from the Pacific Northwest. Three years later he again played a weird, offbeat FBI agent from the Pacific Northwest as agent Dale Cooper in Twin Peaks (A role he is apparently appearing in next year again in a rebooted Twin Peaks). I always felt that maybe “The Hidden” explained how he got that way.

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I used to have a copy of this on VHS that I taped off of HBO or some movie channel when I was in college. I always liked how it was such a foreshadowing of what we would see in Agent Cooper on Twin Peaks.

3

This movie’s a forgotten classic. My favorite part is when Kyle McLachlan tells Michael Nouri that he can read minds:

“Oh yeah? What was I just thinking?”
“That I’m full of shit.”
“Impressive.”
“Not really. Quite simple to read.”

Actually wait, that’s my second favorite part. The best part is when the alien takes over the body of a stripper and discovers he has breasts. :slight_smile:

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Trailer:

Featuring a bit of “Still in Hollywood” by Concrete Blonde (really good band). :slight_smile:

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Ah!!! The movie that began my livelong crush on Claudia Christian <3<3<3<3<3

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That was such a fun movie. It is shame it isn’t shown more often.

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Haven’t seen it in ages but it showed up on Starz in the last week or so and was reminded how smart and fun it is. Holds up really well.

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It’s Mac from Adam-12!

9

It’s an amusing idea, but I got the impression the alien parasite wasn’t going to be able to stay with a body long enough to last through a presidential campaign, let alone be able to pull it off.

10

Man, I haven’t thought about this movie in years - and coincidentally, I just started reading a comic book that’s working a very similar premise. The comic is Weird Detective, and as you can guess from the cover, it’s set solidly in Lovecraft’s Cthulhu mythos. Spoiler from the end of issue one:

The titular “Weird Detective” is a member of the Great Race of Yith, who’s been sent to Earth (via psychic mind-swap) by his people because a flying polyp has awakened on Earth, and he’s supposed to figure out a way to kill it, in hopes of finding a defense against the polyps’ annihilating the Race some five million years from now.

Issue four just came out this month. Really worth checking out!