John Carpenter's involvement with the video game is that he's actually a cameo character in the game and said that its events are canon (take that for what you will)
You are absolutely correct that one of the strengths of this movie is that the characters are SMART and make sensible decisions based upon what they know, but because they are not know-it-alls then their decisions often turn out to be wrong. Bennings was killed because everyone was convinced that the Thing had been killed when they torched the Dog-Thing, and nobody knew that a Thing can survive being frozen solid. Why would they? Blair is convinced that Clark was a Thing, and he was wrong. MacReady was absolutely convinced that Garry was a Thing, and he was wrong. And those are THE two characters who provide exposition for the audience. The entire movie is filled with such moments: the characters are smart, they are resourceful, but they are struggling to understand something that is totally outside their understanding.
Carpenter perfectly encapsulates the ideas that HP Lovecraft was going for in his works. Humans realizing that they aren't the top of the food chain and trying to figure out what to do and survive.
I watched it at the theater, and kept sitting and watched it a 2nd time back to back. The 2011 prequel does not capture the same tension and story is off a bit in the way the play it out. John Carpenter totally played the isolation and tension.... and musical score was tension with the heart beat cadence. A lot like Halloween musical score was like chills. Carpenter deserves a ton of credit for how he uses music in his movies.
To me, the fact that the characters didn't feel idiotic was the selling point and what I took away from the movie when I watched it over everything else. I am greatly enjoying how good this film turns out to be the more I learn about it and hear people talk about it.
4:12 It's interesting that they thought about not including Childs at the end of the movie. His, disappearance would have been a dangling plot thread. As it is, Childs is The Thing at the end of the movie. The reason? Childs tells Mac he went outside because; "I thought I saw Blair, went out after him... Got lost in the storm". This is pretty self-incriminating statment given the informaton we, the audiance are given just before Nauls sees Childs leave the main building. Just before that, but after the men have discovered the small, unfinished spaceship under the tool shed, we are shown the inside of the main building, it appears deserted, and when we come to the coatroom, we see the entrance Childs was gaurding is wide open. In fact it was open for so long that snow is accumulating of the coatroom floor. Where is Childs? He hadn't gone outside yet, because that happens in the next scene. And, why would he leave the door to the building wide open if he did? If he is somewhere inside, where? Garry's office? The Rec room? The Infirmary? The Lab? Maybe he was downstairs in the generator room (but not there willingly). And, again why would he leave the door wide open? Either way, he could not have seen Blair when he said he did. Why? Because, just after leaving the building, the power fails. MacReady knows right away what happened. He tells Garry and Nauls; "It got back inside and blew the generator". Of course, he is talking about Blair. And, of course when the men make their way downstairs after trashing the rest of the camp, that is where the Blair-Thing is waiting in ambush for them. But, this means that Childs could not have seen Blair outside like he said, because Blair, or rather his imitation was under the main building, moments from cutting the power.
@@johnreynolds7996 Kurt Russell laughs about the hat in an interview where he was like I'm not going to wear this, but they had already shot helicopter pilot shots with backups wearing the hat so he was stuck. I think he kind of admits that he was wrong and it worked out well.
I like the characterization of the crew: MacReady and Childs are Men of Action, but both are flawed, MacReady drinks too much, Childs is hot-heated. Garry is their polar opposite. Fuchs is crippled by his insecurity, Blair is too insightful and it drives him insane. Windows is a panic-merchant, and Nauls is too uneducated to be of much help. They are all distinctive characters.
I too am a big fan of James Rolfe and loved Cinemassacre Monster Madness, i disagree with him stating its imbalanced. Its an amazing film, and yeah its wayyyyy better than Howard Hawkes' version imo. The vegetable monster is not scary to me, The imitation alien is absolutely terrifying. Hawkes' was in Arctic, a place animals survive. Antarctica nothing beyond penguins, whales, dolphins, Orca and some fish, and i think maybe a type of seal. Its nothing, all those animals are on the coast, inland Antarctica is nothing but snow, ice and a few mountains. I was pretty disappointed Cinemassacre never spoke about Phantasm until they did and it wasn't a good review at all and just felt tacked on. John Carpenter's The Thing is one of the best films ever made imo.
Agreed on all fronts. It's a movie I more so respect than I like and should not be forgotten. But The Thing is just so brilliant in every facet of its production that it's a shame that Mr. Rolfe can't see that. But I understand his qualms of it being overhyped in this day and age, as that is what kills movies for me personally if the hype is that much. Especially when he loves the original so much and thinks it's getting buried (no pun intended) when it doesn't necessarily deserve it.
Yeah bud, get Scream Factory Collector's Edition BD or 4K Ultra BD if you want to see this movie the best way you can if not a 70mm print. Highly recommend it.
I got the Blu-Ray a while back, pretty sure it was the Scream Factory version. I plan to watch it in December, as that's when I usually watch it since it's a very good winter movie. I am very excited! I have also seen it in theaters when it was re-released and that was such a great experience as well.
Um the 2011 movie is not a remake so you got that wrong since every scene shows what happens before Kurt Russell and Richard Dystart find the Norwegian camp If it was a remake of the 1982 movie then why didn’t they use the characters from the 1982 movie
Except if you fucking listen at the 24 minute mark, you hear me call it a prequel proper. Many have said in regard to the film that since it pretty much feels like the first film but done worse, it feels more like a remake as it does nothing new. Listen before you comment.
There’s so much I could say about why I love this movie so much, but since I don’t have enough space I’ll just say, this is my favorite horror movie.
Hopefully my words can put your own thoughts into words. lol
Ive seen SO many reviews on this movie and i have to say.
This is one of the BEST ones!
Well done Sir!
Thanks very much, that really means a lot.
John Carpenter's involvement with the video game is that he's actually a cameo character in the game and said that its events are canon (take that for what you will)
You are absolutely correct that one of the strengths of this movie is that the characters are SMART and make sensible decisions based upon what they know, but because they are not know-it-alls then their decisions often turn out to be wrong. Bennings was killed because everyone was convinced that the Thing had been killed when they torched the Dog-Thing, and nobody knew that a Thing can survive being frozen solid. Why would they?
Blair is convinced that Clark was a Thing, and he was wrong. MacReady was absolutely convinced that Garry was a Thing, and he was wrong. And those are THE two characters who provide exposition for the audience.
The entire movie is filled with such moments: the characters are smart, they are resourceful, but they are struggling to understand something that is totally outside their understanding.
Carpenter perfectly encapsulates the ideas that HP Lovecraft was going for in his works. Humans realizing that they aren't the top of the food chain and trying to figure out what to do and survive.
I watched it at the theater, and kept sitting and watched it a 2nd time back to back. The 2011 prequel does not capture the same tension and story is off a bit in the way the play it out. John Carpenter totally played the isolation and tension.... and musical score was tension with the heart beat cadence. A lot like Halloween musical score was like chills. Carpenter deserves a ton of credit for how he uses music in his movies.
To me, the fact that the characters didn't feel idiotic was the selling point and what I took away from the movie when I watched it over everything else.
I am greatly enjoying how good this film turns out to be the more I learn about it and hear people talk about it.
Ya have to review PANDORUM!
great scary sci-fi flick!
4:12 It's interesting that they thought about not including Childs at the end of the movie. His, disappearance would have been a dangling plot thread.
As it is, Childs is The Thing at the end of the movie. The reason? Childs tells Mac he went outside because; "I thought I saw Blair, went out after him... Got lost in the storm". This is pretty self-incriminating statment given the informaton we, the audiance are given just before Nauls sees Childs leave the main building. Just before that, but after the men have discovered the small, unfinished spaceship under the tool shed, we are shown the inside of the main building, it appears deserted, and when we come to the coatroom, we see the entrance Childs was gaurding is wide open. In fact it was open for so long that snow is accumulating of the coatroom floor. Where is Childs? He hadn't gone outside yet, because that happens in the next scene. And, why would he leave the door to the building wide open if he did? If he is somewhere inside, where? Garry's office? The Rec room? The Infirmary? The Lab? Maybe he was downstairs in the generator room (but not there willingly). And, again why would he leave the door wide open? Either way, he could not have seen Blair when he said he did. Why? Because, just after leaving the building, the power fails. MacReady knows right away what happened. He tells Garry and Nauls; "It got back inside and blew the generator". Of course, he is talking about Blair. And, of course when the men make their way downstairs after trashing the rest of the camp, that is where the Blair-Thing is waiting in ambush for them. But, this means that Childs could not have seen Blair outside like he said, because Blair, or rather his imitation was under the main building, moments from cutting the power.
The movie is PERFECT!
That's still an understatement lol
Macready's hat steals every scene it is in. The movie should have been named: "THe Hat"
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
His hat is great, but must have gone through the entire movie being insanely jealous of MacReady's beard.
@@johnreynolds7996 Kurt Russell laughs about the hat in an interview where he was like I'm not going to wear this, but they had already shot helicopter pilot shots with backups wearing the hat so he was stuck. I think he kind of admits that he was wrong and it worked out well.
I like the characterization of the crew: MacReady and Childs are Men of Action, but both are flawed, MacReady drinks too much, Childs is hot-heated. Garry is their polar opposite. Fuchs is crippled by his insecurity, Blair is too insightful and it drives him insane. Windows is a panic-merchant, and Nauls is too uneducated to be of much help. They are all distinctive characters.
Yea, super crazy that an ensemble film can work without the need to set it up with films for each character. What a thought! lol
I too am a big fan of James Rolfe and loved Cinemassacre Monster Madness, i disagree with him stating its imbalanced. Its an amazing film, and yeah its wayyyyy better than Howard Hawkes' version imo. The vegetable monster is not scary to me, The imitation alien is absolutely terrifying. Hawkes' was in Arctic, a place animals survive. Antarctica nothing beyond penguins, whales, dolphins, Orca and some fish, and i think maybe a type of seal. Its nothing, all those animals are on the coast, inland Antarctica is nothing but snow, ice and a few mountains.
I was pretty disappointed Cinemassacre never spoke about Phantasm until they did and it wasn't a good review at all and just felt tacked on.
John Carpenter's The Thing is one of the best films ever made imo.
Agreed on all fronts. It's a movie I more so respect than I like and should not be forgotten. But The Thing is just so brilliant in every facet of its production that it's a shame that Mr. Rolfe can't see that. But I understand his qualms of it being overhyped in this day and age, as that is what kills movies for me personally if the hype is that much. Especially when he loves the original so much and thinks it's getting buried (no pun intended) when it doesn't necessarily deserve it.
Ah yes. Kurt russel. He's the 80s version of nathan fillion. An actor's actor.
Yeah bud, get Scream Factory Collector's Edition BD or 4K Ultra BD if you want to see this movie the best way you can if not a 70mm print. Highly recommend it.
I got the Blu-Ray a while back, pretty sure it was the Scream Factory version. I plan to watch it in December, as that's when I usually watch it since it's a very good winter movie. I am very excited! I have also seen it in theaters when it was re-released and that was such a great experience as well.
Um the 2011 movie is not a remake so you got that wrong since every scene shows what happens before Kurt Russell and Richard Dystart find the Norwegian camp
If it was a remake of the 1982 movie then why didn’t they use the characters from the 1982 movie
Except if you fucking listen at the 24 minute mark, you hear me call it a prequel proper. Many have said in regard to the film that since it pretty much feels like the first film but done worse, it feels more like a remake as it does nothing new. Listen before you comment.