"Man is the warmest place to hide"

My first memories of this movie take me back to when I was about 15 and a friend, who is even younger than me was telling me about it. He explained the Norris scene to me in great clarity, and when he was finished regaling his tale of a monster with a gaping jaw for a stomach and heads ripping off and running away, I thought to myself “my god I have to see this movie!” When I finally saw it about a year later I was blown away by it, it had suspense, it had intrigue and paranoia and was all brought to life by the genius of movies such as “The Fog” and “Halloween” John Carpenter.

As it proclaims on the back of the box this is a story about a twelve-man research base in a remote location in the Antarctic, where an alien that’s been in the ice for over 100.000 years gets defrosted by a team of Norwegians and then reeks havoc on the 12 man American research team. The story may sound straightforward at first but its far more complex than you would think, because of the way the “thing” can change its form and replicate humans perfectly in this context destroying the thing almost becomes secondary to identifying it.

The screenplay was actually based on an “ahead of its time” 1938 short story written by John W. Campbell under the pen name of Don A Stuart. Then in 1950 two filmmakers, Howard Hawkins and Christian Nyby brought it to the silver screen under the title “The Thing From Outer space” So the actual idea has been around the block a few times, however Carpenter’s instalment is more faithful to the short story than the original 1950 movie, but does noticeably acknowledge it (the main title graphics for instance) but with the enhancements in creature work instigated by Rob Bottin and Mike Ploog make this movie not just a tense sci-fi thriller, but also a insane Rolla coaster of gore and almost slapstick.

But with all the effects aside probably my favourite scene involves my favourite character, Blair. Once the paranoia of who is who? Gets set in the minds of the research team, Blair (Wilford Brimley) figures that the creature must not reach civilisation, so he destroys the helicopter and the radio, rendering the team completely isolated and cut off. Which basically sets the pace for the rest of the movie, a down hill spiral. Some how Carpenter manages to include all 12 men in various scenes in just one shot, which is a very hard task when its shot inside a confined room, its things like this which really make the movie glow. As well as Dean Cundey’s amazing job of lighting and the glorious sets which where built by John Loyd, which makes this film comes together to present a chilling tale of claustrophobia and paranoia.

It also has one of the most controversial movie endings of all time with a stand off between two of the characters, the base destroyed every one dead, no hope of survival, but who is the thing? Is it one of them or maybes both? There is always allot of speculation about the end, though personally I believe its neither, there was a second rough ending shot which actually confirmed that one of the characters was indeed the thing but was scrapped (and I won’t tell you which one it was, cause that would spoil the movie if you haven’t seen it)

Another strange point about the movie is that it’s an all male cast, and was an all male film crew, lets face it, in these equal opportunist times that is a pretty rare thing! So any way, I could bang on all day about my favourite film of all time but I won’t instead just buy the DVD because it’s one of the best DVD’s out there, with an amazing documentary, and comes complete with full-length audio commentary by Carpenter and Kurt Russell.

Approximate running time 104 minutes Directed - John Carpenter Screenplay – Bill Lancaster Special visual effects - Albert Whitlock Make up & creature effects - Rob Bottin Original score - Ennio Morricone Director of photography - Dean Cundey Associate producer - Larry Franco Executive producer - Wilbur Stark Cast Kurt Russell – Macready A.Wilford Brimley – Blair T.K Carter – Nauls David Clennon – Palmer Keith David – Childs Richard Dysart – Dr Copper Charles Hallahan – Norris Peter Maloney – Bennings Richard Masur – Clark Donald Moffat – Garry Joel Polis – Fuchs Thomas Waites – Windows

BACK TO FRONT

Credit: Pictures House of Horrors.com