Welcome to a special Fright Fest edition of Movies I Love. This edition WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.
The year was 1982. Before bluescreen and cheap looking CGI effects were the norm (both of which have been a thorn in my side for quite some time, give me old fashioned practical effects any day). It was this year that a new kind of horror would be unleashed onto this Earth and movie going audiences everywhere.
The Thing follows a group of twelve American scientists stationed at a research post in Antarctica as the harsh winter season starts. Soon enough, the cold won't be the biggest problem they have to face. Shortly after two crazed and frantic Norwegians from a nearby research outpost chase a sled dog into camp (shooting and throwing grenades at it all the way there, both are killed for safety reasons), a foreign invader is set loose upon the unsuspecting American camp creating tension, fear, and paranoia amongst the crew as it slowly becomes clear that one or more crew members may not be who they say they are.
The Thing takes its time building itself up, the big reveal of the film's main antagonist coming in at minute 28 of the 109 minute run time. These 28 minutes give us time to build connections with these characters, and also gives us some backstory for the film. When The Thing begins, tension has already grown considerably among the crew of outpost 31 (the name of the American camp), they have been stuck in Antarctica for a while so it is safe to assume that most of the crew are already suffering from cabin fever. They are tired and weak, making them the perfect victims for The Thing (This is the creature's universally agreed upon name, it is never referred as anything else in the film besides It and that Thing).
Among the crew members, most fans seem to latch upon R.J. MacReady as their favorite. Mac is the main helicopter pilot for the camp, and appears to suffer from alcoholism. We first meet him while he's playing a game of computer chess, when the computer outwits him Mac mutters that it is a "cheating bitch" and pours alcohol into it, frying the computer ( a nice parallel and foreshadowing to the end). When things get rough, he would appear to be the last person who would take control, but he is in reality the first. As crew members point fingers at each other and tempers flair, Mac remains the only one with a clear head and so ends up becoming the captain of sorts for the camp. As played by Kurt Russell, Mac is all too human and is not without his faults. Although an apparent alcoholic (in fact, most crew members can be seen drinking alcohol throughout the film) Mac is able to sober up enough so that he is able to take charge as only he can. The great thing about The Thing is that anyone could be infected, even the hero. Despite this possibility, most (myself included) still latch onto MacReady, and is it really hard to imagine why? Not only is Mac bad-ass, but he's also smart and is all too aware of The Thing's purpose in spreading paranoia among the group. With a flamethrower at his side, Mac easily emerges as one of the coolest characters that can be sampled in a Carpenter film.
The Thing deals heavily with themes of paranoia and trust. When anyone could be a traitor, even yourself....who do you trust? It is this basic idea that results in the camp's ultimate destruction. The beautiful thing about The Thing, is that it wants paranoia to spread, and does it's part in framing certain members of the camp. If everyone is pointing fingers and fighting with each other, it makes the group as a whole weaker and thus makes The Thing's job that much easier.
The Thing is a creature from a far away world that crash landed in Antarctica and promptly froze in the harsh climate. Norwegians discover it, and presuming it to be dead, dig it up and drag it into their camp thinking they have made the discovery of a lifetime (this leads me into another theme in the film, Greed and curiousity will ultimately be our downfall). Once in camp it thaws out and proceeds to wreak havoc on the area, eventually getting chased into the American camp. It's fatal weakness is fire (hence the large use of flamethrowers in the film). The Thing is an inherently selfish being, it will sacrifice one of it's own without a second thought if it means it's own survival. The Thing is also very smart, it creates a plan and carefully follows it through. Every action The Thing takes is calculated and thought out in advance.
I love The Thing because it is one of the rare intellectual horror films that manages to mix in a good deal of gross out gore into it's proceedings. The Thing's transformations are stomach turning in all the right ways. It's completely revolting to see human limbs stretch and twist into other worldly shapes and contours, but it's so fascinating that it's hard to look away. Most will probably feel their stomach twist into pretzel shaped knots during these parts. All of the effects seen in The Thing are practical, remember, this was before CGI and bluescreen were super popular like they are today. To me, seeing practical effects being used in a film makes the proceedings more believable. It's like a breath of fresh air (Unfortunately, The thing prequel will be using lots of CGI...such a shame).
The Thing is also neat because the paranoia spreads out to the viewer as well. During the first viewing, most will find themselves pointing fingers along with the crew. During repeated viewings (and trust me, there WILL be repeated viewings. there's so much to digest and think about in this film that repeated viewings are just about guaranteed....myself, I must have seen the film at least 5 times thus far) they will find themselves thinking about when someone got infected or why one of the Things acts the way it does.
The power of The Thing comes from it's refusal to provide any answers to the numerous questions encountered in the film, including it's satisfyingly ambiguous and dark ending. Viewers are encouraged to come up with their own answers and explanations to what is witnessed in the film. Perhaps that's what I love most about this horror classic: it doesn't talk down to it's audience. It presumes that the viewer has some semblance of intelligence and leaves him/her to create answers for him/herself.
The Thing is one of the best horror films you can find today. It deftly mixes intelligence, sci-fi, horror, ample gore, and even has a surprising message in the end. It's my personal favorite horror film. Chalk it up as another great film from master director John Carpenter.
5/5 STARS BETTER THAN SEX
Fun fact: The character names of Mac and Windows are also names of popular computer software we use today. Macintosh and Windows.
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