Don Siegel Invasion of the Body Snatchers

Don Siegel (October 26, 1912 – April 20, 1991) directed the 1956 Invasion of the Body Snatchers for Allied Artists. He appears in Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) as the taxi driver who carries Matthew and Elizabeth toward the airport while the pod dispatchers track them on the radio.

Siegel started at Warner Bros. in the montage department and won two Oscars before directing features

Siegel joined Warner Bros. in 1934, rose to head of the montage department, and directed thousands of montage sequences — including the opening montage for Casablanca. In 1945, two shorts he directed, Star in the Night and Hitler Lives, won Academy Awards. He moved to features in 1946 and spent the next decade making lean, fast genre pictures for modest budgets. (Wikipedia, Senses of Cinema)

He could shoot up to 55 camera setups in a day and planned every shot in advance. The style was documentary-inflected — natural lighting, handheld cameras, moral ambiguity built into the casting rather than the dialogue. Brian Eggert, in his definitive essay on the 1978 film, credited Siegel's economical approach as the model Philip Kaufman (in Body Snatchers, as director) built on:

"Kaufman and Richter utilize their specific setting so that everything onscreen feels awakened from its familiar slumber." — Brian Eggert, Deep Focus Review (2018)

Siegel's own instinct ran toward the morally unstable:

"I also like going the other way. I don't like my heroes to be all good." — Don Siegel, Senses of Cinema (2004)

Siegel considered Body Snatchers his best film

Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) was made cheaply and quickly — less than $15,000 went to special effects. Siegel placed the pressure on the actors instead.

"This is probably my best film because I hide behind a facade of bad scripts, telling stories of no import and I felt that this was a very important story." — Don Siegel, Scraps from the Loft (compiled interview)

"We spent very little on special effects, less than 15,000 dollars, with which our production designer, Ted Haworth, worked miracles. We concentrated on the story and the acting, instead of spending thousands on special effects and sticking wooden actors on the screen." — Don Siegel, Scraps from the Loft (compiled interview)

The McCarthyism reading was inevitable and he knew it. He declined to endorse it.

"The political reference to Senator McCarthy and totalitarianism was inescapable but I tried not to emphasise it because I feel that motion pictures are primarily to entertain and I did not want to preach." — Don Siegel, Scraps from the Loft (compiled interview)

What he did endorse was the pod as a recognizable human type — people without affect, going through the motions.

"I think that the world is populated by pods and I wanted to show them. I think so many people have no feeling about cultural things, no feeling of pain, of sorrow." — Don Siegel, Scraps from the Loft (compiled interview)

Allied Artists forced a framing device onto his bleaker ending

Siegel's cut ended with Kevin McCarthy stranded on a highway, screaming at cars that would not stop. No rescue, no FBI, no resolution. Allied Artists ordered reshoots in September 1955 and added bookends — a hospital, a skeptical doctor, a phone call to the authorities. The framing device closes what Siegel had left open. He hated it and said so for the rest of his life. See The 1956 Original for the full account.

Kaufman knew this history and refused to repeat it — the 1978 remake ends the way Siegel had wanted the original to end. See The Ending (Invasion of the Body Snatchers).

Siegel mentored Clint Eastwood across five films

After Body Snatchers, Siegel moved into larger-budgeted action pictures. His partnership with Clint Eastwood produced five films: Coogan's Bluff (1968), Two Mules for Sister Sara (1970), The Beguiled (1971), Dirty Harry (1971), and Escape from Alcatraz (1979). Eastwood has credited Siegel, alongside Sergio Leone, as one of the two directors who formed his own filmmaking sensibility.

"If you're with a director like Sergio or Don, that makes it fun. Makes it come out like you hoped it would come out." — Clint Eastwood, Metrograph (interview)

Eastwood dedicated Unforgiven (1992) "to Sergio and Don." Siegel had died the year before. (Wikipedia)

He also directed John Wayne's final film, The Shootist (1976).

Kaufman cast Siegel as the pod taxi driver as tribute and apology

Philip Kaufman approached Siegel during preparation for the 1978 remake. The cameo — Siegel as a cabbie who is already a pod, driving the protagonists into a trap — was both an acknowledgment and a correction. The original director plays a figure of authority who has already been absorbed. See Kevin McCarthy and Don Siegel Cameos for the full sequence.

"Too often people rip off films without acknowledging the source, and I wanted to fully acknowledge the original by putting Don Siegel in that taxi cab driving them to the airport." — Philip Kaufman, It Came From Blog (2018)

Selected filmography

Year	Film	Notes
1954	Riot in Cell Block 11	Sam Peckinpah was dialogue coach
1956	Invasion of the Body Snatchers	Allied Artists; studio altered ending
1962	Hell Is for Heroes	Steve McQueen, WWII
1968	Coogan's Bluff	First Eastwood collaboration
1970	Two Mules for Sister Sara	Eastwood, Shirley MacLaine
1971	The Beguiled	Civil War Gothic; Eastwood
1971	Dirty Harry	Eastwood as Inspector Callahan
1973	Charley Varrick	Walter Matthau; heist thriller
1976	The Shootist	John Wayne's final film
1979	Escape from Alcatraz	Final Eastwood collaboration