UFOctober: THE FACULTY (1998)
THE FACULTY is one of those movies that came out at a formative time in my life. I was just getting into horror and sci-fi more seriously, and I was at the right age to feel connected to the protagonists. It had been a while since I’ve gone back to it but I decided to rewatch it recently and it still works for me on every level, so I thought why not do a deep dive into one of the movies that helped make me the sci-fi fan that I am today.
Originally written in 1990 by writers David Wechter and Bruce Kimmel, THE FACULTY was a script that just seemingly couldn’t be sold. It was understandable at the time, seeing as horror involving teens was on the wane. Freddy, Jason, and Michael Myers were all fading into obscurity, making way for a shift in what was popular in the horror genre: teens were out, adult thrillers like MISERY and JACOB’S LADDER were in. The script languished, going from studio to studio with no interest. That is until a movie came out in 1996 that would put THE FACULTY on the production fast track.
1996 saw the release of SCREAM, and with it, a reinvention of the teen horror craze was underway. Studios began buying any scripts they could get their hands on to cash in on it. From URBAN LEGEND to I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER and everything in between, the studios were all in a mad dash to keep this new era of horror going.
Prior to SCREAM, Williamson was just like Wechter and Kimmel, a screenwriter with limited success. He had managed to sell one script that was unproduced—his script for an adaptation of a 1973 Lois Duncan thriller was being passed over, and his pitch for a teen drama TV show was sitting on the backburner. After SCREAM every single one of those projects came to fruition. His unproduced script became his directorial debut TEACHING MRS. TINGLE; the Lois Duncan adaptation was fast tracked into production and became I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER, and his TV pitch became a little show known as Dawson’s Creek. Williamson was, for lack of a better term, a true Hollywood success story. It was during this successful run that he was hired to re-write THE FACULTY.
Having read Williamson’s first draft of the film - given a potential retitling of THE FEELER - I can see the bones of the final product, but I can also see where it needed polishing. It doesn’t fit the tone that the film has, opting for a slightly darker feel, perhaps as a nod to the style of the sci-fi/horror films it was emulating. Even the dialogue doesn’t entirely feel akin to what Williamson was known for in terms of wit and cleverness.
Another disconnect between the script and the film is its characters. One of the biggest examples is the character of Casey, named Pacey in the script (Williamson must really like that name). He is a much more, for lack of a better word, pathetic character. Multiple scenes are set up to establish his tortured existence in high school including a scene where he is stripped naked by a gang of girls as a punishment for an earlier slight.
Williamson stuck with a formula that worked well with SCREAM and decided to add a whodunnit element to the script. The problem is, it feels extremely obvious throughout that...spoiler alert for a nearly 30-year-old movie...Marybeth, the new girl at school, is the queen alien. She constantly talks to the other characters about how they don’t have to conform to the stereotypes that they have been put into or that they can change. It feels less like a big reveal when she turns into her monstrous alien form and more like a head slappingly obvious one.
One aspect of the script I will give Williamson credit for is that he establishes stakes. Where the final cut of the film gives almost everyone a happy send off, Williamson’s script doesn’t pull any punches and kills off some of the leads. One scene altered from script to screen sees a different fate for Famke Janssen’s Miss Burke. Instead of somehow reattaching her head and continuing an inappropriate relationship with one of her students, Zeke runs it over in a scene that would feel right at home in a Sam Raimi or early Peter Jackson film.
Following a release strategy like the one they utilized with the preceding SCREAM films, Miramax released THE FACULTY on Christmas Day, hoping to gain a strong foothold over the Holiday season. The strategy did not work as they had hoped with THE FACULTY opening fourth at the box office behind the more lighthearted fare of PATCH ADAMS, STEPMOM, and YOU’VE GOT MAIL. It was far from a box office disaster, but it also didn’t set the world on fire.
Having seen the trailer and various TV spots over multiple months and having nearly worn out my copy of SCREAM and SCREAM 2 on VHS, I was extremely excited to go see this in theaters. Much to my surprise, my dad even wanted to see this. I say to my surprise because my father was one of the rare people who didn’t immediately love SCREAM, so I assumed he would want to avoid anything even remotely associated with it.
With my dad on board, the two of us took one of our frequent trips to the theater two weeks after the initial release (my dad’s method of avoiding big crowds) and prepared ourselves for a good time. We both wound up having a great time, my dad picking up the homages to older sci-fi and me enjoying the cool special effects and the performances. The movie was even a hit with my siblings, so much so that my sister and I used quotes from it as a means to pass the time when we were bored.
Much like THE THING before it, THE FACULTY has achieved a reappraisal and it’s truly great to see. It deserves a top spot in the pantheon of great sci-fi movies even if it hides it in a teen horror shell.
