The Thing (1982)

Humble Subjects,

It would appear I have to apologize again. At the end of my last post I apologized to all of you readers for suggesting that you didn't have lives by virtue of you finding my blog. In my apology, I said that you did have lives, but at the same time I may have also suggested that they weren't fulfilling. Let's square with each other here: your lives probably aren't fulfilling at all. That's why you're at this blog in the first place. However, just because this may be true does not permit me to make fun of and belittle you. You, readers, have lives that lack most of everything that one would consider necessary to living a life with "meaning" and "purpose." But that's alright. At least you have this blog.

Now for this blog post I am going to discuss a movie that came out some time ago. John Carpenter's "The Thing" was released in 1982. I was not alive at the time, so I don't really know how the world received this remarkable film. However, in October of this year, a prequel to this fine piece of film-Americana will be released. It is aptly also called "The Thing." I felt that if I am to review the new "The Thing," I ought to first cover the old "The Thing."

"The Thing" is a film about a badass alien. Directed by one of the masters of thrills (John Carpenter), the entire  film is set in everyone's favourite (notice the British spelling) continent: Antarctica. As is expected, Antarctica is cold and snowy. The film follows a crew of American researchers at the South Pole as they deal with the infiltration of an alien life-form that has the nifty ability to imitate any organism it has killed and absorbed. A brief aside: you read me right. The damn alien has nasty tentacles that will latch onto an organism, kill it, then take that organism's form and imitate it so the alien can move around incognito and pounce on its victims when they least expect it.

Now the film starts with, of all people, Norwegians. A couple of nutty Norwegians are flying a helicopter over the scenic Antarctic landscape chasing a dog (or is it?). These Norwegians have a powerful rifle and are taking shots at the "dog", but apparently they are the worst shots possibly in the world. There are a few instances where the helicopter is hovering fifteen feet above the "dog" and they still can't hit it. After shooting for a while with no results, the Norwegians up the ante: grenades. They start dropping grenades on the "dog" and missing just as they approach the American base at the South Pole. In a fluid scene of action, they land, accidentally set off a grenade right by there helicopter, destroy said helicopter with said grenade, shoot at the "dog" as it is right by the Americans, and get their asses killed by the Americans all while yelling in Norwegian something to the effect of, "That dog is the devil, a real whore. It killed Johnny. Johnny is dead. That dog will tell you it loves you and say it will be there for you forever and ever but really it will just kill Johnny."

After the episode with the Norwegians, the Americans are a tad confused. Kurt Russell, the American helicopter pilot, and a doctor decided that the best course of action to take is to go to the Norwegian camp and figure out what's what. Little do they know that Johnny is dead. So, they set off.

TANGENT ALERT

Kurt Russell is a real badass kind of guy in this film. He was a rousing coach in "Miracle" and he's always had a go-get-'em mentality in film, but he has an extra level of manliness in this film. I believe this is such because he has on of the greatest beards in film history. I mean, this beard would put Grizzly Adams to shame. I'm a big fan of beards because they are not only warm but also scream "the wilderness is my bitch." Apparently, if this film is scientifically accurate, beards are also the perfect defense from imitating aliens. If I am not mistaken, no man with a beard ever gets turned into an alien. Sure they all die, but none ever become aliens...except for the ginger. There is one ginger in the whole crew with a beard and he does get killed and imitated, but I think being a ginger cancels out the whole having a beard thing. Anyway, if you aren't a redhead and want to protect yourself from crazy alien bastards, a beard is the way to go. Also, I'm pretty sure girls secretly love beards even though they always say, "It's too scratchy, I honestly don't like beards."

END OF TANGENT

So, Kurt Russell (whom I will refer to as "The Beard") and the doctor get to the Norwegian camp and, oh shit, it's burned the ground. They've already had to deal with the Thing and they failed. No surprises considering they're Norwegian. The Beard and the doctor, in all of the wreckage, discover a large block of ice that has been carved into and apparently something large was in it. They scramble back to their base and the film begins to get very interesting.

The "dog" is stuck into a kennel with all of the other real dogs and it begins to try and kill and imitate all of them. Luckily, it is stopped before it can complete its process. The human weapon of choice: flamethrower. I don't know why the Americans have flamethrowers at a research facility but I am not complaining. Now the American's know what they are dealing with and they also know, more disturbingly, that the Thing has probably already killed and imitated some of them. It's about to get tricky. A few autopsies are performed and a couple of Things show themselves. It gets nasty. Very nasty. It should be noted that the Beard develops a scientific method for figuring out who is a Thing and who isn't through burning blood samples from each person and a couple of torchings result from this.

The film ends with a grand explosion, but I'm not going to spoil it for those of you who want to see this fantastic film.

One thing I do want to cover quickly is how Hollywood is no longer scary. It seems that all horror flicks these days rely on either making things as gross as possible, having things pop out from the dark, or having small dead girls with long black hair crawl around to various places. That is the equation for "horror" these days. What they fail to do is keep people anxious. There's no suspense these days. "The Thing" had suspense. "The Thing" also did a great job bringing out feelings of dread in the audience in a way that no movie in the past five years has. Where did all the good suspense go? Hopefully the new "The Thing" will take a few pages out of the original "The Thing's" book and build up suspense and dread. Then it will be a good movie and a classic horror flick.

Later Bitches,

DG