There's a brilliant parallel between Kurt Russell's introduction and the end of the movie. He loses the chess match in his introduction, so he destroys the computer. The thing outplays him in the end so he blows up the base.
Add to that the pretty vague but very interesting links between Russell's drinking after losing chess and handing Childs a drink when they are together at the end (when Childs could be a Thing). An excellent amount of mystery for the film, great movie
Another interesting thing, the chess computer did cheat as the move it made was impossible. Not sure if that was intentional or not but interesting still
I'd call that more like major reaching than anything. Nothing to show a person is a sore loser other than blowing up a base. No other reason to blow it up at all. Especially not any interdimensional overpowering body snathers. Nope. Nothing at all.
well it was released in Northern Hemisphere summer, which is Southern Hemisphere winter (aka where Antarctica is) so they did do this in a certain sense
wonderguardstalker Yeah that's the only scene it works for. Even later in the film when the Blaire thing kills Gary you can clearly see a glint in its eyes.
But I wanted that prequel. And it was made by true fans of the original. Very awesome effort ruined by the suits who replaced much of the awesome practical effects with CGI. I'll admit that the ending was a little weak, though.
@@jna6246Learning that they created ACTUAL practical props for the scenes of The Thing for that prequel movie, including that scene were you see the guy start getting assimilated, was depressing. I don’t understand why higher ups dont realize that practical effects will look better and hold up for YEARS. CGI effects look extremely dated within a couple years while practical effects stand the test of time
@@daskampffredchen Just rewatched the prequel. I noticed the CGI the worst when it jumps through the ceiling. It really lacked the subtlety of the original. The female lead is too prominent in being the only thinking character while everyone else is either antagonistic or doesn't have much to do. They don't develop the other characters and there are too many of them, so when they get killed off a bunch at a time, you just don't care. I did feel like it got better at being creepy later in the movie and closer to the original. Having the female character survive felt kind of empty. I realized after that there didn't seem to be too much stupidity from the characters, so there's that. The movie feels too clean and modern for being a setting based in the 80's. They should have shot it in film to give it that vibe. My only other major gripe is that it was a remake instead of being a well crafted prequel with a more original script. I suppose the nature of the problem is this prequel did not need to be made. Just from how the Norwegian camp is discovered this scenario clearly played out somehow, but that is best left to the imagination. Seeing it played out just feels repetitive and it's boxed in to the things we already know about the monster and 80's Thing.
You don't mention that the best part of this movie; the fact that the characters make rational decisions based on what they know. The character's aren't stupid, and they don't get into trouble simply because the writer or director needs them to in order to ramp up the tension. No one makes a foolish decision. You are never once screaming at the screen going "Why did he do that? I would never do that! Why doesn't he do this?" They all act in a reasonable way, despite the unreasonable situations they are in. Great characters, and great writing.
That's why I'm on the Prometheus hate train. We don't do it to feel popular, Ridley Scott fans, we just ride that train because that biologist character was so goddamn stupid.
Great example, mate, of where things happen because the writer/director/producer/whoever wanted to see them happen, and so contrived events to get there, rather than allowing the characters to make reasonable decisions given their knowledge of the situation.
Jimmy De'Souza I think you could put some of those down to shock or a lack of understanding of the situation. I don't expect the characters to make the perfect decision every time, just a reasonable one given what they are going through.
I feel like some of that could be attributed more to the shock and exhaustion of the characters. The Norwegians also had been through some shit so it makes sense for them to be irrational.
Nothing against Colin, but I kinda would have liked to see Mike on this one. He has said before he isn't a big John Carpenter fan so it might have been interesting to see him reviewing the best Carpenter film with that bias in place.
Klaus Kinski was the perfect casting choice for the remake, but Max Schreck was - and is still to this day - iconic. The fact that fans can have a clear favorite, but totally understand how anyone could favor the other is a testament to the quality of both films!
There are definitely two camps as to which one is better. I prefer the remake, which is rather daft, since the original is a groundbreaking landmark in cinema (despite Gustave von Wangenheim's hammy acting), and without it, the remake wouldn't exist, but the remake (for me, at least) is an objectively better film, but I think it boils down to whether you like your horror straight up or more folk/fairytale.
Even when i know it's a semi mechanical rubber puppet covered in fake blood, it still is a discusting puppet that i would hesitate to even touch. CGI does not come close to creating that level of creeped-out-ness in me.
Also most of the time cgi things somehow manage to look like they dont have mass. Sometimes they over animate/over physics simulate and that just ruins it. Its a really fine line. The worst parts are when cgi has to interact with real things and its almost always obvious that cgi is a slave to real objects or actors motions. "You may not have noticed this, but your brain did."
A buddy of mine lend me his un-cut version and I made the mistake to watch it at night, while I was alone in the house. That night and the following nights I couldn't really sleep......My mind always thought that there is a weird dog monster sticking in the corner, reaching out for me. And when RLM showed parts of the dog transformation scene I felt this awful sickening punch in the gut. The effects are probably the best of it's genre. It still leaves me reeling every time to the point where I want to close my eyes. The images of this movie just burns into your mind. This is far away from modern jump-scares horror movies.
Have you guys seen Pingu's The Thing, a recreation of most of the iconic story beats from The Thing with children's show claymation penguins? It's actually pretty amazing.
I love everything about the thing. The soundtrack is great because it does such a good job of setting the tone and feel, while drawing you in. The movie feels cold, and you feel like you could actually freeze to death if you where there. The characters and fear it creates is perfect. The practical effects are both beautiful, haunting and sort of look a little unreal but fits whats going on so perfect. Ive watched this movie so many times, and that dog cage scene always scares and unnerves me so much, even just the noise of the thing.
my theory; it boils down to framerate. film had it relatively low, so the true nature of practicals never stuck out. now that everything is cgi and nothing is practical, ultrahigh fps and clarity actually works against stuff like this. it stands the fuck out.
It is more than just framerate, it is also the lighting and actors reacting or beeing surprised by some effects that are actually happening in front of them. Don't get me wrong, there is great cgi around nowadays, but if it's done wrong it just has a totally diffrent kind of eeriness than any practical effect. Bad cgi is just scarily laughable, while even bad practical effects can cause some real dread and fright, even if it's not a horror flick 😅
The main theme is absolutely by Ennio Morricone (pronounced 'Morri-coney' not 'Morri-cone') and it sounds just like Carpenter because Carpenter asked him for something 'simpler and spookier' and 'not to do so many notes' and he came back with basically an impersonation of a Carpenter theme - which I think is kind of fitting, due to the subject matter. If you listen to the original soundtrack album (which features only the music Morricone composed), the theme is featured in ‘Humanity Pt. 2’ and he also uses the same melody in a slower orchestral arrangement in the track ‘Humanity Pt. 1’, which is also used in the film. Carpenter and Howarth maintain that they only created some moody, interstitial cues - great ones at that - including the music that plays during the reveal of the title. I totally understand why people assume Carpenter must have written the main theme -- I thought the same thing! -- but Carpenter says the theme is Morricone's (he even said so before he performed the theme in his live shows a couple years back) and Morricone says it's his, and both men have no reason to lie about it, so... it's his.
What are you talking about. As an italian, it is pronounced Morri-con-e, with the e pronounced like in "end" and the double r it is pronounced like actually saying r two times in a row.
I'm really surprised you didn't bring up the screams of the thing. It's one of the more unsettling parts about the film, especially with the severed head the way it cries out as it's set on fire. Reminds me of the scream from the 70s Invasion of the Body Snatchers.
@@epochpilot9404 I found that so unsettling even though it was the least grotesque scene with “the thing” I grabbed my bf’s arm and said “nope, don’t like that, I’m out!” And then I had my eyes glued to the tv the whole movie.
In the prequel it makes sense that the thing isnt shy about showing itself as it's most likely his first interaction with humans and he obviously learned it's lesson which is why it disguises itself in the original.
My favorite movie of all time! I remember seeing the dog scene as a young boy by accident and it scared the living shit out of me. Didn't watch the full movie until I was a teenager. It was so amazing!
One movie that I would consider a good horror remake like the thing and the fly, is the 1988's the blob, the remake of the 58's steve mcqueen film. The film is similar to the original, a 50's monster horror film, but everything is made better. I recommended, some scenes are campy fun and anothers are actually haunting.
Yes, the blob is great. But, do you feel like they ran out of budget for the final third of the movie? The effects are not on par with the rest of the film. I always felt like that was the case.
Fun fact: At the time this movie was filmed, Wilford Brimley was only four years older than Mike is now. Wilford Brimley has looked like an elderly man for most of his adult life.
Just saw this in Atlanta at the Plaza theater with my family. Great film, and an even better experience. The thing flopped back in 82, but when the movie ended the whole theater roared with applause. Redemption for John Carpenter.
Watching enough movies, you can get a sense when a shot is out of place and anticipate that something is about to happen. The fact that John Carpenter used the same shot with the fake hand is brilliant and totally caught me off guard.
The Norris-Thing has some fillings in his teeth as he lies on the operation table when you watch closely. So it is inconsistent with the prequel. So the Childs earring argument 36:00 is void.
even if that weren't the case, the thing learns to use piercings by the end of the 2011 remake, which was a prequel. so childs-thing could've just put the earing back in after assimilating childs.
Tom Woodruff Jr came to talk at my school last year, and went on a bit about how all their effects were covered with cgi. He's still peeved by it, to say the least
I would be holding a grudge to. They did the hole movie with practical affects just like the original, they even had a fully animatronic alien pilot inside the crashed spaceship that they covered with freaking Tetris blocks, only for the idiots in charge at the very tail end of production to say "no use CGI" and all of that hard work gets removed and replaced with bad, rushed CGI. I'd be pissed as hell if I got such a massive slap to the face.
The part in the prequel that busts my balls is when the alien on the helicopter reveals himself. LIKE WHY!? WHY DID HE DO THAT?? He ended up killing himself in the process! The only reason he revealed himself is because the people behind the scenes thought it’d be a good twist that it actually wasn’t the sick guy who was the Thing. It was the guy who was telling him that everything was gonna be ok... and then he split his face open... and then caused a helicopter crash. Which led to his own death. I hate the prequel.
As soon as I saw that scene, my heart sank. I already wasn't getting good vibes from the prequel, but that moment in the helicopter pretty much solidified that it was going to be a pile of trash. And it was.
I think the scariest part about the film is that the monster feels so unbeatable. When you watch a zombie movie everyone has their 'what would I do during a zombie apocalypse' plan where they'd be like 'Oh I'd just go onto an oil rig' or some shit, or watching a slasher there's always a million things you can think of to keep you alive in that situation. But if you're up against the Thing there is very little wargaming the average horror movie watcher can do that gets them out alive; the creature is OP in the best way
I had the pleasure of working with Richard Dysart, the actor who played "Doc." He told me how they actually did the "monster biting off his arms" sequence. According to him, the got an Iraq war vet who had lost both of his arms in the war to stand in for him, then put an actual latex death mask of Dysart over his face in the final shot, all of the special effects done practically, in real time (no CGI in 1982). Then, he shared with me a rather intimate question, which I found rather intriguing, which for the first time I will share with you. Richard Dysart's acting career largely dealt with very upstanding, professional types like doctors and judges and lawyers and such. But I think he felt a little worried about being in this movie, because he asked me "what I thought" about his appearance in it. I was kind of flattered that he'd even ask my opinion, but since he was being totally honest, I would be totally honest, too. I said, "First of all, I think it's going to be a cult classic. The entire ensemble cast was excellent. But your presence in this film brought a level of class and gravitas to it that no other actor could have done," and I meant every word of it. As he silently mulled over what I had just said, I added: "Every good actor must occasionally do things that stretch his boundaries. It's good to do something different for a change, you know??" I don't know for sure, but I think my words of encouragement actually made him feel better about doing the project. I hope so, anyway. RIP, Richard Dysart.
*You're lying, and you're probably a pathological liar.* The "Iraq war vet" part is the tip-off, since this movie came out in 1982. I could almost believe you meant an Iran-Iraq war vet or something like that-but then you had to "share" a flamboyant and elaborate story, filled with 1) common knowledge, 2) unlikely detail and 3) grandiose exact quotations of yourself, where you lectured an actor in this well-known movie about his role in it, where you predicted it would be a "cult classic" in an extremely improbable way. Self-aggrandizement barely veiled by praise of someone else.
@@MegaZeta I just found your reply, albeit 3 years late. Thanks for the correction, he couldn't have been a Iraq war veteran, more likely a Vietnam era vet, but according to Dick, a war veteran nonetheless. When you hit my age you'll have to excuse my obvious mistake, you'll see what I mean when you get here. But calling me a "flamboyant," "pathological liar" is quite another thing. Had you said that to this 75-year old man's face, you wouldn't be as brave a keyboard warrior as you'd like to appear. As for the rest of your obviously butt hurt narrative, no one but myself knows of Dysart's apparent reluctance to do this role as it was told to me in confidence when I worked with him when I had a part in his most recognized role as the head of a law firm in "LA Law" a few years later. So I could intimately understand his concern. I also worked on Carpenter's "Big Trouble in Little China" where John actually introduced me to Dean Cundy, his DP on "The Thing." When I told him that "I'd actually seen The Thing twenty times," he replied: "Then you saw it more times than I did." If you'd care to dispute this claim too, be my guest. You obviously have no other purpose for living.
In defense of the way it behaves in the prequel, it may have thought that humans were weaker than we are. What happened in the old camp was clearly madness and it didn't really work out for it. I figure when it got to McCready's group, it learned to be a little more careful. Don't get me wrong. The Carpenter flick is a classic and one of my favorites, but I didn't find the reboot insulting or anything.
Eh, the prequel just falls into way too many cliches of the horror industry today. "We have all of these fancy effects we can use, so it's easier to do monster scenes now! PUT THE MONSTER FUCKING EVERYWHERE! It's not a horror movie without the monster! More monster, more horror!" The CG just does not look good and there is no subtlety to any of it. Practical effects from the 80's somehow looks better and are more effective horror wise than a film that came out only a few years ago. And a big part of why they are so effective is that the are used sparingly in high tension moments.
despite being a 'prequel' the 2011 film beat for beat copies the 1982 film. There is NO reason what happened at the Norwegian base should have unfolded practically identically to what happened at the American base. Ridiculous. Lazy. cheap. They could have made it their own. Honestly the fact they decided to go with a prequel on its own is kind of sad, like it's fairly easy to summarize what happened at the Norwegian camp based on the carnage left over when Mcready and Co. walk through it, and the reality is SOME mystery of what happened is what makes it so fascinating. Making a prequel was illogical when that story had already been basically told, we don't need to see a lazy copy of what happened at the American camp also happen at the Norwegian camp. They should have just remade the film or taken the concept and created something completely new. The 2011 film is just depressing. The CGI looks awful and for a good portion of the film (especially the middle section) it literally plays out annoyingly similarly to the 82 classic. Biggest disappointment of a reboot/prequel/whatever ever
But you're foergetting one key thing, The Thing has assimilated a billion organisms, it already knows everything it needs to know. It should've been smart enough to use Stealth.
The Thing (1982) is one of my favorite films and I'd say it's one of the greatest films of all time. The 2011 prequel was a love letter ruined by a moronic studio/producer with miserable CGI. I still very much enjoy the 2011 film and there's a lot of fantastic detail in it that most unfortunately overlook or ignore, which I think is a bummer. It's not as bad of a film as most make it out to be in my opinion. There's plenty to criticize, without a doubt.. However I think it's redeeming qualities still stand out. I'd love to see what it would've been like with the practical effects intact and not ruined by CGI..
AbsentProductions Yeah, same. It's not a patch on the original, but it's still an interesting idea. And yeah, fuck prequels, but at least it wasn't a bloody remake. A sequel might have been a better idea, but they'd have had to be smart and somehow preserve the ambiguous ending the original is so famous for.
I say yes if you can separate Rooster Cogburn from John Wayne, which is hard to do. Rooster got John Wayne his first Oscar. The remake is definitely a great western movie in it's own right though.
I agree. I prefer the Coens' version to Hathaway's (Wayne's) or even Portis's. That stretch from A Serious Man to Inside Llewyn Davis might be my favorite in their career.
Tomasz Sobocinski It's a dark secret only Carpenter truly knows, legend has it the movie had to be entirely rewritten and all staff but carpenter removed....They all got AIIIIIDDDS.
Actually, compared to something like, say, Ghostbusters, an all-female The Thing remake would at least allow you to explore some interesting themes, like the differences in the way an all-female group handles the same situation as an all-male team, and the different conflicts that could arise, etc.
@@lokuendog guarantee you the feminists would lash out and have the filmmakers doxxed, mass media would critically pan it and call anyone who likes it misogynists, you name it.
@@CrusaderLogan Annihilation happened and no one did any of this lol. Probably because it wasn't a remake and not marketed on being a "female movie" it didn't need that... it was just good on its own
The Thing was an amazing alien to conceive. The mystery behind its origin, what it originally was, where it came from, etc., doesn't and shouldn't be told but holy hell is it something to think about. A really amazing sci-fi horror movie and story overall. Would have been awesome to see this for the first time in a theater.
One of the best horror movies ever made. The claustrophobia, mistrust and brooding soundtrack just nailed the rest of a great creature feature home. A remarkably good script and solid acting doesn't hurt either. Don't make 'em like they used to. I agree 100% that this is the best Carpenter flick. Only Aliens and Nightmare on Elm Street scared me quite like this movie did back in the day.
Also... this is my all time favourite movie. I qatch it a couple of times a year. I have also sat through all the bonus footage on the dvd countless times. I bought the 4k collectors edition and it is gorgeous!
There are movies I enjoy rewatching more than this, but there's no movie I remember as fondly. This is my favorite movie and I love hearing y'all praise it.
I have this little thing I like imagining, where I would go back in time and show people movies from the future. If I showed this to people who just saw 1951's The Thing, I think they would actually be traumatized.
According to the new list it is your favorite JC movie Mr. B. Are we to believe that opinions can change? Many thanks as always for the amazing content. Hope WI doesn't freeze over this winter. Hoosier myself.
There was a PS2 The Thing video game that was a sequel to the movie, and John Carpenter has given his stamp of approval of it being the official sequel to the movie. In the game, we find out that Kurt Russel was in fact still human, and Keith David was in fact the thing. Kurt Russel somehow manages to get away and makes an appearance at the end of the game.
Prince Solomon Practical effects definitely can help actors. The chest burster in the original Alien let the actors have a genuine reaction. Even when watching things about the new Jurassic World, the actors were saying that use of animatronics and puppets in certain scenes really allowed them to interact and engage with the dinosaurs. To much CGI can even hurt an actors performance. A good example are the Star Wars prequels. The negative effects the CG had were even talked about in Red Letter Media‘s Mr. Plinkett Episode III review. I’m not saying all CG is bad and practical is always better, but there are still things CGI can’t do convincingly and too much of it is almost never a good thing.
Another slow burn is Annihilation which may be the best Sci-Fi film of this generation. What no one is talking about are the similarities between John Carpenter's The Thing and Annihilation: isolation, duplication, mutation. The bear scene, where the women are tied up, is straight out of the blood test scene from The Thing...with a twist. Also, an all-male cast in The Thing and an all-female cast in Annihilation. You get my point...
The fact that there is a RLM video about this fucking movie and I haven't seen it in 3 years simultaneously fills my mind with regrets for missing out for this long, but also with joy for discovering for the first time.
My favourite horror, my first exposure to it was from recording another movie from TV in the early 90s and this being the late night movie after whatever I was recording, but the tape stopped just after the dog-alien-tentacle morph scene which freaked the hell outta me (as an 11/12ish year old) but piqued the morbid curiousity for more.
There's a few good remakes that are country to country. True Lies. Remake of La Totale, a french movie. The Departed. Remake of Infernal Affairs, a chinese movie.
I feel fortunate to have seen this in the theaters in a sneak preview. Loved it then, love it now. Possibly the last great use of practical effects? I'd still like to know why, when the transformed dog pulls itself up to the ceiling, there is the distinct sound of a rusty pulley.
Wow. It seems that "The Thing" has gotten more press than JonBenet Ramsey! I first saw the premier of the film at the Directors Guild of America, in Los Angeles. At Guild screenings they had only two rules: You were forbidden to leave before the movie ended, and you had to sit through all of the credits in support of the other unions. I have learned the good sense in this over the years, and I believe that everyone should do the same, out of begrudging respect, if nothing else. I recall that the audiences, consisting of 90% industry professionals, usually began talking about a film directly afterward. But after "The Thing," they could only manage to sit there in total shock. I loved it. They just weren't prepared to see such graphic and horrifying violence on the screen, and unfortunately all but a few gave it highly negative reviews. So I find it doubly gratifying that so many year later it only continues to gain the respect it so obviously deserved. Btw, I also watched the "prequel" this year which I thought was a totally unnecessary attempt at nothing more than ripping off nearly every single key scene in the Carpenter classic. Worse still was in their hiring of one of the most bland and boring actresses ever in order to attempt to compete with Kurt Russell's commanding performance, a decision even worse that their plagiarizing of the original 'Thing' concept.
Isn't that great though? It assimilated the good Thing movie, and created a copy. A disgusting copy out to destroy you. Replaced the tension with action scenes. Covered the SFX with the CGI virus. All to invade you, and ruin it for you. Like the movie is The Thing itself. They did that on purpose. They spent millions of dollars to fail just for the gag, and I commend them for it. That's commitment
CGI isn't bad in itself, it's just that almost nobody uses it properly anymore. In fact if John Carpenter's The Thing was made a decade later it would be using the same stop-motion technology that was invented for Jurassic Park used and would have used some CGI mixed in with practical effects for that final encounter in the basement much the same way CGI and practical effects are deftly used to bounce off one another properly in the T-Rex paddock attack scene. The 2011 The Thing prequel was really bad for a lot of reasons and they went overboard and ruined all of that hard work with practical effects but there are definitely moments where use of CGI would've been appropriate. CGI should always be fleeting and intercut with shots of practical effects the 2011 prequel could've pulled that off in a few spots if some producer or whomever didn't decide to take a dump on it. Almost everybody who worked on that film did a real, genuine effort into making the film good, even the folks who did the CGI, and the movie was doomed due to the bad decisions of a handful of people. It's a real shame and it reminds me of the SciFi channel series that was going to be made based on the 1982 film never got it's feet off the ground. Those handful of people who make the bad decisions are often the same ones that are the only reason the film or tv show gets made in the first place.
thing 2011 would have sucked even if it was all practical since it was clear that the filmmakers weren't trying to recreate the paranoia and instead went to monster in your face
Yeah but Ebert gave the star wars prequels a positive review.. I rather listen the opinion of those hacks at the VCR repair store rather than that fraud
In the first scene with the dog before the Norwegians land, there is a really good foreshadowing shot of the chopper of the Norwegians trying to kill the thing doggy and a very present chevron barrel with a flammable sticker (edit: furthermore it shows a good juxtaposition for the heavy blues and reds present in the film, after they go into blow up the camp everything turns red where before it was blue)
When you talk about 'unused music from The Thing used in The hateful eight' around 10:30 - I'm pretty sure that part of the music was used in the thing, namely in the scene where they fly to the site crashed UFO was and climb down the cliffs and Mac asks Doc (forgot his name) how long he thinks the thing was under the ice. Pretty sure that part plays right there.
Another sin of the 2011 prequel. It did so poorly that it spooked Hollywood...and got Guillermo del Toro's 'Beyond the Mountains of Madness' cancelled.
Spooking investors is a thing in all studios...you need the money to make these films. It's not Hollywood, so much as the movie industry as a whole (not Indy so much, but you don't get big budget Indy films without investors either).
I'm glad you brought this up. Ebert really dated himself as the years went by. He truly showed some conceit in the '80s whenever any movie had even the slightest of gore. If you read his 4/4 star Phantom Menace review, he actually says he will forgive a weak story if it has imaginative visuals any day. And those visuals look terrible today. I think he was of that era to be impressed by now-dated CGI. Fine, but by slamming the mastercraft of The Thing's special effects, he really comes across as a huge hypocrite.
watched "the thing" (1982) for the first time today thanks to an anime girl called Pomu Rainpuff and wow was it an amazing movie!! After finishing it we decided to do another watchalong of this review, she loves RLM! This review was the perfect way to digest the movie, Thank you!
Someone once told me that John Carpenter used his wives in all his movies in some way or another. I instantly said "There are no women in "The Thing". the person looked back at their phone for a second and said..." Oh, the computer." Macready pours a drink on it and call it a cheating bitch, lol.
I love it when Jay hates on films. He's passionate and fucking brutal in the driest sense. I probably like it more when he loves films. Enthusiasm, and much more insight. These are the times when I kinda learn things about films.
Someone pointed out somewhere that the theme song to John Carpenter's The Thing sounds almost like a human heartbeat, but just different enough to be off putting. Such a great little detail I had never noticed before.
I watched it tonight. I thought it WAS a heartbeat. I didn't notice ANY of the music besides those little beats and I didn't even realize that it was music.
It's always the movies that affect you in some way that makes or breaks it for critics. When it came to these films, the content of them disturbed people so much that they just wrote it off as 'shock value', which is stupid. It's like what Stephen King said about The Shining. "This is a movie made to hurt people," or something. If the movie succeeds at what it's aiming for, then that's a good thing! Movies that invoke real emotion in the viewer are good, damn it! 'Mainstream critics' are just pretentious jerkoffs that don't actually appreciate films they watch. Art direction, scores, shot composition, it doesn't matter to them. But that's what you should expect from the mainstream itself.
It's because horror is a very niche appeal. A lot of people don't like feeling scared or disturbed, so they pan movies that are actually scary while praising movies that are labeled 'horror' even if they actually aren't. The recent trend of horror movies over the past decade has been much more horrifying in how it's happened than any of the movies themselves.
@Bobby Peru To be fair, all you need to do is watch BOTW to kind of understand why. Horror and action are really open to exploitation, so I can kind of understand why critics might think this movie is just trying to capitalize on shock value and gore effects. They saw those, which are typical of exploitative b-movies, and made assumptions about the intent of the director rather than judging the film on it's own merits. But you know what happens when you assume...
If Stephen King wrote this, it wouldve had: a human bully, a team member with psychic ability the Thing wouldve been an "elemental demon" it wouldve taken place in a lighthouse in Derry, Maine where the team is cut off due to a hurricane and flooding.
Fun fact. If you are norwegian, swedish or danish the fact that the dog is a monster is revealed in the first minutes of the movie. The desperate scientist in the beginning litherally screams "the dog is a monster" in norwegian(not that it isnt kind of obvious that something is weird, but still).
We don't dub, that's a German thing. Actually, the reason we Scandinavians all know English may be linked to that fact. Sadly they dub kids material now...
I thought he would have been more famous for everyone spouting off his line of "Don't ask questions. Just consume product and get excited for next product."
We all fucking know he came for the pinball wizard dude come on idk if you’re trolling or not but it’s the PINBALL WIZARD that the thing needs to stop focusing on.
The pinnacle of horror movies. What a small team of artists achieved here with practical effects hasn't been surpassed by rooms filled with CGI artists on computers. Much like Rich Evans, it gets creepier every time I watch it. :-D
The delay in filming really forced Carpenter to spend more time evaluating characters and considering the story than he normally would, which is I think why it came out so much better. I imagine if Alaska had been clear at the time, we may have gotten a much more typical Carpenter film.
Through it all, I think what warms my heart the most about the film is that Carpenter finally got to see his favorite movie get the respect it deserved. It took a couple of decades, but he's alive to see and know just how beloved The Thing's become over the years.
@@namelesswalaby True, but The Thing flopped hard in its day, commercially and critically, and it wasn't particularly profitable for him either, so he was actually pretty bitter about all that for a long while. There was some other director, or a writer, who had lunch with him back in maybe the 80s or 90s, and the wanted to mention how much he loved The Thing and what an excellent movie it was, and how Carpenter should be so proud of it, but Carpenter kind of just dismissed that praise because it bombed, he felt that it didn't really mean much. I can only imagine that it must have felt extremely cathartic and vindicating that the movie gradually grew to be rightfully recognized as the masterpiece that it actually is, especially with how everyone else on the film crew really put their best effort in too.
There's a brilliant parallel between Kurt Russell's introduction and the end of the movie. He loses the chess match in his introduction, so he destroys the computer. The thing outplays him in the end so he blows up the base.
Wow, that's yet another thing in this movie I've never noticed before
Add to that the pretty vague but very interesting links between Russell's drinking after losing chess and handing Childs a drink when they are together at the end (when Childs could be a Thing). An excellent amount of mystery for the film, great movie
Another interesting thing, the chess computer did cheat as the move it made was impossible. Not sure if that was intentional or not but interesting still
Deep
I'd call that more like major reaching than anything.
Nothing to show a person is a sore loser other than blowing up a base.
No other reason to blow it up at all.
Especially not any interdimensional overpowering body snathers.
Nope. Nothing at all.
My favourite film of all time. I always go back to watch it whenever its freezing cold, leave a window open, get myself fully immersed. Its so good
Clemps! What a pleasant surprise.
Nice!
First Plague and now you.
The Thing analysis when?
Shouldn't you be playing Octopath right now?
The film should have been released "the first goddamn week of winter".
No.
well it was released in Northern Hemisphere summer, which is Southern Hemisphere winter (aka where Antarctica is) so they did do this in a certain sense
Holy shit that detail about the eyelight is too neat.
Turbo Button
Absolutely, I never consciously picked up on that (which is the point)
wonderguardstalker Yeah that's the only scene it works for. Even later in the film when the Blaire thing kills Gary you can clearly see a glint in its eyes.
new video when?
Turbo Button I told my friends about that after they watched it for the first time and they immediately wanted to see it again
Vanilla Sky did something similar in the close-up of Tom Cruise's face as he dies at the end, you can see his eye light slowly fade away, spooky
We needed a The Thing prequel about as much as Kurt Russell needed that Chess Wizard.
But I wanted that prequel. And it was made by true fans of the original. Very awesome effort ruined by the suits who replaced much of the awesome practical effects with CGI.
I'll admit that the ending was a little weak, though.
@@jna6246Learning that they created ACTUAL practical props for the scenes of The Thing for that prequel movie, including that scene were you see the guy start getting assimilated, was depressing. I don’t understand why higher ups dont realize that practical effects will look better and hold up for YEARS. CGI effects look extremely dated within a couple years while practical effects stand the test of time
@@jna6246 The practical effects were great but a lot of problem arent caused by the effects. It was pretty much a campy monster movie in Antarctica
@@daskampffredchen
Just rewatched the prequel. I noticed the CGI the worst when it jumps through the ceiling. It really lacked the subtlety of the original. The female lead is too prominent in being the only thinking character while everyone else is either antagonistic or doesn't have much to do. They don't develop the other characters and there are too many of them, so when they get killed off a bunch at a time, you just don't care. I did feel like it got better at being creepy later in the movie and closer to the original. Having the female character survive felt kind of empty. I realized after that there didn't seem to be too much stupidity from the characters, so there's that. The movie feels too clean and modern for being a setting based in the 80's. They should have shot it in film to give it that vibe. My only other major gripe is that it was a remake instead of being a well crafted prequel with a more original script. I suppose the nature of the problem is this prequel did not need to be made. Just from how the Norwegian camp is discovered this scenario clearly played out somehow, but that is best left to the imagination. Seeing it played out just feels repetitive and it's boxed in to the things we already know about the monster and 80's Thing.
Colin has some serious movie knowledge. I love hearing him and Jay discuss movies.
You don't mention that the best part of this movie; the fact that the characters make rational decisions based on what they know. The character's aren't stupid, and they don't get into trouble simply because the writer or director needs them to in order to ramp up the tension. No one makes a foolish decision. You are never once screaming at the screen going "Why did he do that? I would never do that! Why doesn't he do this?" They all act in a reasonable way, despite the unreasonable situations they are in. Great characters, and great writing.
That's why I'm on the Prometheus hate train. We don't do it to feel popular, Ridley Scott fans, we just ride that train because that biologist character was so goddamn stupid.
Great example, mate, of where things happen because the writer/director/producer/whoever wanted to see them happen, and so contrived events to get there, rather than allowing the characters to make reasonable decisions given their knowledge of the situation.
Jimmy De'Souza I think you could put some of those down to shock or a lack of understanding of the situation. I don't expect the characters to make the perfect decision every time, just a reasonable one given what they are going through.
I feel like some of that could be attributed more to the shock and exhaustion of the characters. The Norwegians also had been through some shit so it makes sense for them to be irrational.
Love me some colin on re:View.
WIll do.
"These fucking prequels can fuck off!"
Nothing against Colin, but I kinda would have liked to see Mike on this one. He has said before he isn't a big John Carpenter fan so it might have been interesting to see him reviewing the best Carpenter film with that bias in place.
I ship 'em.
Was he that knowledgeable Russian sailor who had some friends in the industry?
Werner Herzog's Nosferatu remake is stunning.
agreed, but the original is still better
Klaus Kinski was the perfect casting choice for the remake, but Max Schreck was - and is still to this day - iconic. The fact that fans can have a clear favorite, but totally understand how anyone could favor the other is a testament to the quality of both films!
how about ben hur from 1959
There are definitely two camps as to which one is better. I prefer the remake, which is rather daft, since the original is a groundbreaking landmark in cinema (despite Gustave von Wangenheim's hammy acting), and without it, the remake wouldn't exist, but the remake (for me, at least) is an objectively better film, but I think it boils down to whether you like your horror straight up or more folk/fairytale.
Not daft at all. Like I said, its easy for anyone to see how either could be anyone's favorite!
Even when i know it's a semi mechanical rubber puppet covered in fake blood, it still is a discusting puppet that i would hesitate to even touch. CGI does not come close to creating that level of creeped-out-ness in me.
Also most of the time cgi things somehow manage to look like they dont have mass. Sometimes they over animate/over physics simulate and that just ruins it. Its a really fine line. The worst parts are when cgi has to interact with real things and its almost always obvious that cgi is a slave to real objects or actors motions.
"You may not have noticed this, but your brain did."
A buddy of mine lend me his un-cut version and I made the mistake to watch it at night, while I was alone in the house. That night and the following nights I couldn't really sleep......My mind always thought that there is a weird dog monster sticking in the corner, reaching out for me.
And when RLM showed parts of the dog transformation scene I felt this awful sickening punch in the gut. The effects are probably the best of it's genre. It still leaves me reeling every time to the point where I want to close my eyes. The images of this movie just burns into your mind. This is far away from modern jump-scares horror movies.
Unless it's unintentional. CGI Leia in Rouge One made me recoil in horror, no joke.
You know what's really weird? Is that this could actually happen. Now that's scary.
Have you guys seen Pingu's The Thing, a recreation of most of the iconic story beats from The Thing with children's show claymation penguins? It's actually pretty amazing.
Thingu is amazingly well made.
Ha! Thank you for introducing this to me 😂
One of the absolute best re:view episodes. The Thing is timeless in it's execution.
I love everything about the thing. The soundtrack is great because it does such a good job of setting the tone and feel, while drawing you in. The movie feels cold, and you feel like you could actually freeze to death if you where there. The characters and fear it creates is perfect. The practical effects are both beautiful, haunting and sort of look a little unreal but fits whats going on so perfect. Ive watched this movie so many times, and that dog cage scene always scares and unnerves me so much, even just the noise of the thing.
Ironically now the CG of the prequel is dated and looks like shit, thanks hollywood producer.
my theory; it boils down to framerate. film had it relatively low, so the true nature of practicals never stuck out. now that everything is cgi and nothing is practical, ultrahigh fps and clarity actually works against stuff like this. it stands the fuck out.
It is more than just framerate, it is also the lighting and actors reacting or beeing surprised by some effects that are actually happening in front of them. Don't get me wrong, there is great cgi around nowadays, but if it's done wrong it just has a totally diffrent kind of eeriness than any practical effect. Bad cgi is just scarily laughable, while even bad practical effects can cause some real dread and fright, even if it's not a horror flick 😅
@@intergalacticspacecanoe4659 movies still don't play at higher than 24 fps what are you on about
I think we can all agree that the VFX in Dune are pretty goddamn amazing.
You know what I love of this show? Those awkward silence moments
I find myself coming back to this video all the time.
Otherwise known as: The Best Horror Movie Ever
This, and Alien.
I wouldn't say the best horror film up there but certainly up in the top 10. I still think Halloween is Carpenter's best work.
William James I would agree, it's my personal favourite at least.
William James - The Shining, The Exorcist, The Thing, Alien - all of them more or less on equal footing.
Evil Dead it is not.
The main theme is absolutely by Ennio Morricone (pronounced 'Morri-coney' not 'Morri-cone') and it sounds just like Carpenter because Carpenter asked him for something 'simpler and spookier' and 'not to do so many notes' and he came back with basically an impersonation of a Carpenter theme - which I think is kind of fitting, due to the subject matter. If you listen to the original soundtrack album (which features only the music Morricone composed), the theme is featured in ‘Humanity Pt. 2’ and he also uses the same melody in a slower orchestral arrangement in the track ‘Humanity Pt. 1’, which is also used in the film. Carpenter and Howarth maintain that they only created some moody, interstitial cues - great ones at that - including the music that plays during the reveal of the title. I totally understand why people assume Carpenter must have written the main theme -- I thought the same thing! -- but Carpenter says the theme is Morricone's (he even said so before he performed the theme in his live shows a couple years back) and Morricone says it's his, and both men have no reason to lie about it, so... it's his.
What are you talking about. As an italian, it is pronounced Morri-con-e, with the e pronounced like in "end" and the double r it is pronounced like actually saying r two times in a row.
Shut the fuck up, nerd
I'm really surprised you didn't bring up the screams of the thing. It's one of the more unsettling parts about the film, especially with the severed head the way it cries out as it's set on fire. Reminds me of the scream from the 70s Invasion of the Body Snatchers.
You're not surprised, you just wanted to use this channel's popularity to boost your banal opinion
Absolutely. The scene where they catch Bennings half-transformed, and he opens his mouth to just scream still gets me every time.
@@MegaZeta What?????
@@MegaZeta Bruh what planet are you living on?
@@epochpilot9404 I found that so unsettling even though it was the least grotesque scene with “the thing” I grabbed my bf’s arm and said “nope, don’t like that, I’m out!” And then I had my eyes glued to the tv the whole movie.
In the prequel it makes sense that the thing isnt shy about showing itself as it's most likely his first interaction with humans and he obviously learned it's lesson which is why it disguises itself in the original.
My favorite movie of all time! I remember seeing the dog scene as a young boy by accident and it scared the living shit out of me. Didn't watch the full movie until I was a teenager. It was so amazing!
Wow I didn't know it got destroyed by critics, this thing is a masterpiece.
I will attest that I only ever drank j&b because of Kurt Russel in The Thing
One movie that I would consider a good horror remake like the thing and the fly, is the 1988's the blob, the remake of the 58's steve mcqueen film. The film is similar to the original, a 50's monster horror film, but everything is made better. I recommended, some scenes are campy fun and anothers are actually haunting.
TheScape55 yeap.
Yeah that movie is sick, for a campy 80's horror movie. I still feel a little queasy thinking of some of the death scenes.
Super underrated movie. I want it on Blu-ray so bad but I believe it's currently out of print.
Yes, the blob is great. But, do you feel like they ran out of budget for the final third of the movie? The effects are not on par with the rest of the film. I always felt like that was the case.
I forgot about the blob...my 11 yo self would be disappointed
Fun fact: At the time this movie was filmed, Wilford Brimley was only four years older than Mike is now.
Wilford Brimley has looked like an elderly man for most of his adult life.
so has Mike
I havent seen a lot of Brimley’s work, but I did read he was often given roles playing characters older than he was.
Just saw this in Atlanta at the Plaza theater with my family. Great film, and an even better experience. The thing flopped back in 82, but when the movie ended the whole theater roared with applause. Redemption for John Carpenter.
Watching enough movies, you can get a sense when a shot is out of place and anticipate that something is about to happen. The fact that John Carpenter used the same shot with the fake hand is brilliant and totally caught me off guard.
I was eleven when I saw this at the drive-ins. It's been one of my Top 3 Flicks of all Time for over 35 years now!
The Norris-Thing has some fillings in his teeth as he lies on the operation table when you watch closely. So it is inconsistent with the prequel. So the Childs earring argument 36:00 is void.
even if that weren't the case, the thing learns to use piercings by the end of the 2011 remake, which was a prequel. so childs-thing could've just put the earing back in after assimilating childs.
Still one of my favourite horror movies. I loved hearing you guys talk about it.
16:55 😂
Tom Woodruff Jr came to talk at my school last year, and went on a bit about how all their effects were covered with cgi. He's still peeved by it, to say the least
I would be holding a grudge to. They did the hole movie with practical affects just like the original, they even had a fully animatronic alien pilot inside the crashed spaceship that they covered with freaking Tetris blocks, only for the idiots in charge at the very tail end of production to say "no use CGI" and all of that hard work gets removed and replaced with bad, rushed CGI. I'd be pissed as hell if I got such a massive slap to the face.
The part in the prequel that busts my balls is when the alien on the helicopter reveals himself. LIKE WHY!? WHY DID HE DO THAT?? He ended up killing himself in the process! The only reason he revealed himself is because the people behind the scenes thought it’d be a good twist that it actually wasn’t the sick guy who was the Thing. It was the guy who was telling him that everything was gonna be ok... and then he split his face open... and then caused a helicopter crash. Which led to his own death. I hate the prequel.
As soon as I saw that scene, my heart sank. I already wasn't getting good vibes from the prequel, but that moment in the helicopter pretty much solidified that it was going to be a pile of trash. And it was.
Holy shit I just rewatched The Thing last night! What a coincidence
You're a SEER!
YS Kim Same!
Not the biggest horror fan but this movie is my huge exception. Gotta be an all time favorite of mine.
This movie is so good it makes me want to cry tears of joy and thankfulness
Probably the only 42 minute video that I wasn’t bored at all.
I think the scariest part about the film is that the monster feels so unbeatable. When you watch a zombie movie everyone has their 'what would I do during a zombie apocalypse' plan where they'd be like 'Oh I'd just go onto an oil rig' or some shit, or watching a slasher there's always a million things you can think of to keep you alive in that situation. But if you're up against the Thing there is very little wargaming the average horror movie watcher can do that gets them out alive; the creature is OP in the best way
I had the pleasure of working with Richard Dysart, the actor who played "Doc." He told me how they actually did the "monster biting off his arms" sequence. According to him, the got an Iraq war vet who had lost both of his arms in the war to stand in for him, then put an actual latex death mask of Dysart over his face in the final shot, all of the special effects done practically, in real time (no CGI in 1982). Then, he shared with me a rather intimate question, which I found rather intriguing, which for the first time I will share with you.
Richard Dysart's acting career largely dealt with very upstanding, professional types like doctors and judges and lawyers and such. But I think he felt a little worried about being in this movie, because he asked me "what I thought" about his appearance in it. I was kind of flattered that he'd even ask my opinion, but since he was being totally honest, I would be totally honest, too. I said, "First of all, I think it's going to be a cult classic. The entire ensemble cast was excellent. But your presence in this film brought a level of class and gravitas to it that no other actor could have done," and I meant every word of it. As he silently mulled over what I had just said, I added: "Every good actor must occasionally do things that stretch his boundaries. It's good to do something different for a change, you know??" I don't know for sure, but I think my words of encouragement actually made him feel better about doing the project. I hope so, anyway. RIP, Richard Dysart.
*You're lying, and you're probably a pathological liar.* The "Iraq war vet" part is the tip-off, since this movie came out in 1982. I could almost believe you meant an Iran-Iraq war vet or something like that-but then you had to "share" a flamboyant and elaborate story, filled with 1) common knowledge, 2) unlikely detail and 3) grandiose exact quotations of yourself, where you lectured an actor in this well-known movie about his role in it, where you predicted it would be a "cult classic" in an extremely improbable way. Self-aggrandizement barely veiled by praise of someone else.
@@MegaZeta
I just found your reply, albeit 3 years late.
Thanks for the correction, he couldn't have been a Iraq war veteran, more likely a Vietnam era vet, but according to Dick, a war veteran nonetheless. When you hit my age you'll have to excuse my obvious mistake, you'll see what I mean when you get here. But calling me a "flamboyant," "pathological liar" is quite another thing. Had you said that to this 75-year old man's face, you wouldn't be as brave a keyboard warrior as you'd like to appear.
As for the rest of your obviously butt hurt narrative, no one but myself knows of Dysart's apparent reluctance to do this role as it was told to me in confidence when I worked with him when I had a part in his most recognized role as the head of a law firm in "LA Law" a few years later. So I could intimately understand his concern. I also worked on Carpenter's "Big Trouble in Little China" where John actually introduced me to Dean Cundy, his DP on "The Thing." When I told him that "I'd actually seen The Thing twenty times," he replied: "Then you saw it more times than I did." If you'd care to dispute this claim too, be my guest. You obviously have no other purpose for living.
In defense of the way it behaves in the prequel, it may have thought that humans were weaker than we are. What happened in the old camp was clearly madness and it didn't really work out for it. I figure when it got to McCready's group, it learned to be a little more careful.
Don't get me wrong. The Carpenter flick is a classic and one of my favorites, but I didn't find the reboot insulting or anything.
Eh, the prequel just falls into way too many cliches of the horror industry today. "We have all of these fancy effects we can use, so it's easier to do monster scenes now! PUT THE MONSTER FUCKING EVERYWHERE! It's not a horror movie without the monster! More monster, more horror!" The CG just does not look good and there is no subtlety to any of it. Practical effects from the 80's somehow looks better and are more effective horror wise than a film that came out only a few years ago. And a big part of why they are so effective is that the are used sparingly in high tension moments.
despite being a 'prequel' the 2011 film beat for beat copies the 1982 film. There is NO reason what happened at the Norwegian base should have unfolded practically identically to what happened at the American base. Ridiculous. Lazy. cheap. They could have made it their own. Honestly the fact they decided to go with a prequel on its own is kind of sad, like it's fairly easy to summarize what happened at the Norwegian camp based on the carnage left over when Mcready and Co. walk through it, and the reality is SOME mystery of what happened is what makes it so fascinating. Making a prequel was illogical when that story had already been basically told, we don't need to see a lazy copy of what happened at the American camp also happen at the Norwegian camp. They should have just remade the film or taken the concept and created something completely new. The 2011 film is just depressing. The CGI looks awful and for a good portion of the film (especially the middle section) it literally plays out annoyingly similarly to the 82 classic. Biggest disappointment of a reboot/prequel/whatever ever
But you're foergetting one key thing, The Thing has assimilated a billion organisms, it already knows everything it needs to know. It should've been smart enough to use Stealth.
^^^ That's what's hypothesized by blair. Its right there in the movie, you just need to pay more attention.
The Thing (1982) is one of my favorite films and I'd say it's one of the greatest films of all time. The 2011 prequel was a love letter ruined by a moronic studio/producer with miserable CGI. I still very much enjoy the 2011 film and there's a lot of fantastic detail in it that most unfortunately overlook or ignore, which I think is a bummer. It's not as bad of a film as most make it out to be in my opinion. There's plenty to criticize, without a doubt.. However I think it's redeeming qualities still stand out. I'd love to see what it would've been like with the practical effects intact and not ruined by CGI..
AbsentProductions Yeah, same. It's not a patch on the original, but it's still an interesting idea. And yeah, fuck prequels, but at least it wasn't a bloody remake. A sequel might have been a better idea, but they'd have had to be smart and somehow preserve the ambiguous ending the original is so famous for.
And a far better ending.
I'd sayTrue Grit is part of that good remakes list
I say yes if you can separate Rooster Cogburn from John Wayne, which is hard to do. Rooster got John Wayne his first Oscar. The remake is definitely a great western movie in it's own right though.
it's alright
+PixelRelatedismyname, but that's the point of this review: that John Carpenter went back to the source-material for his remake...
I was actually horribly disappointed with that movie
I agree. I prefer the Coens' version to Hathaway's (Wayne's) or even Portis's. That stretch from A Serious Man to Inside Llewyn Davis might be my favorite in their career.
Wasn't the original title for this film John Carpenter's "Rich Evans"
with wilfred brimley as the diabeetus
Tomasz Sobocinski It's a dark secret only Carpenter truly knows, legend has it the movie had to be entirely rewritten and all staff but carpenter removed....They all got AIIIIIDDDS.
When are we gonna get the all female The Thing remake?
Actually, compared to something like, say, Ghostbusters, an all-female The Thing remake would at least allow you to explore some interesting themes, like the differences in the way an all-female group handles the same situation as an all-male team, and the different conflicts that could arise, etc.
@@lokuendog guarantee you the feminists would lash out and have the filmmakers doxxed, mass media would critically pan it and call anyone who likes it misogynists, you name it.
You kind of got this with Annihilation. Although a possible contamination with Alien DNA is not the only danger there.
@@CrusaderLogan Annihilation happened and no one did any of this lol. Probably because it wasn't a remake and not marketed on being a "female movie" it didn't need that... it was just good on its own
Whiner.
The chemistry of you gents is impeccable. I’m trawling your back catalog now having just discovered the channel. Loving life x
Jay what the hell was that clip at the beggining
It's called Mr. Stitches by Charles Cullen
The Thing was an amazing alien to conceive. The mystery behind its origin, what it originally was, where it came from, etc., doesn't and shouldn't be told but holy hell is it something to think about.
A really amazing sci-fi horror movie and story overall. Would have been awesome to see this for the first time in a theater.
One of the best horror movies ever made. The claustrophobia, mistrust and brooding soundtrack just nailed the rest of a great creature feature home. A remarkably good script and solid acting doesn't hurt either. Don't make 'em like they used to. I agree 100% that this is the best Carpenter flick. Only Aliens and Nightmare on Elm Street scared me quite like this movie did back in the day.
Two Jays one Re:view
Also... this is my all time favourite movie.
I qatch it a couple of times a year.
I have also sat through all the bonus footage on the dvd countless times.
I bought the 4k collectors edition and it is gorgeous!
There are movies I enjoy rewatching more than this, but there's no movie I remember as fondly. This is my favorite movie and I love hearing y'all praise it.
I had no idea about that 'Police Squad' ending. Now I know why Bad Obsession Motorsport does it at the end of videos! :D Project Binky!
I have this little thing I like imagining, where I would go back in time and show people movies from the future. If I showed this to people who just saw 1951's The Thing, I think they would actually be traumatized.
"Up in Antarctica" smh
In Australia, everything is up in Antarctica. RLMs Australia branch is doing well.
greatest horror movie ever made and one the greatest movies ever
"I can't think of anything worthwhile I did ever...." *crickets*
According to the new list it is your favorite JC movie Mr. B. Are we to believe that opinions can change? Many thanks as always for the amazing content. Hope WI doesn't freeze over this winter. Hoosier myself.
There was a PS2 The Thing video game that was a sequel to the movie, and John Carpenter has given his stamp of approval of it being the official sequel to the movie. In the game, we find out that Kurt Russel was in fact still human, and Keith David was in fact the thing. Kurt Russel somehow manages to get away and makes an appearance at the end of the game.
One of my favorites of all time! I love the practical effects
Even if they remade this movie today with the best CGI possible, I don’t think it would even compare to the original.
Toad139 It wouldn't. The look would be too modern and take away the realism.
Prince Solomon Practical effects definitely can help actors. The chest burster in the original Alien let the actors have a genuine reaction. Even when watching things about the new Jurassic World, the actors were saying that use of animatronics and puppets in certain scenes really allowed them to interact and engage with the dinosaurs. To much CGI can even hurt an actors performance. A good example are the Star Wars prequels. The negative effects the CG had were even talked about in Red Letter Media‘s Mr. Plinkett Episode III review. I’m not saying all CG is bad and practical is always better, but there are still things CGI can’t do convincingly and too much of it is almost never a good thing.
Another slow burn is Annihilation which may be the best Sci-Fi film of this generation. What no one is talking about are the similarities between John Carpenter's The Thing and Annihilation: isolation, duplication, mutation. The bear scene, where the women are tied up, is straight out of the blood test scene from The Thing...with a twist. Also, an all-male cast in The Thing and an all-female cast in Annihilation. You get my point...
The fact that there is a RLM video about this fucking movie and I haven't seen it in 3 years simultaneously fills my mind with regrets for missing out for this long, but also with joy for discovering for the first time.
My favourite horror, my first exposure to it was from recording another movie from TV in the early 90s and this being the late night movie after whatever I was recording, but the tape stopped just after the dog-alien-tentacle morph scene which freaked the hell outta me (as an 11/12ish year old) but piqued the morbid curiousity for more.
There's a few good remakes that are country to country.
True Lies. Remake of La Totale, a french movie.
The Departed. Remake of Infernal Affairs, a chinese movie.
I still maintain that Infernal Affairs is the better version.
Internal Affairs is a korean film.
The Wages of Fear - Sorcerer
Infernal Affairs is an absolutely great film.
@sibah 8: Check Wikipedia. Hong Kong is not in Korea. Andy Lau is not Korean.
My favorite movie ever yeeehhhh
I feel fortunate to have seen this in the theaters in a sneak preview. Loved it then, love it now. Possibly the last great use of practical effects? I'd still like to know why, when the transformed dog pulls itself up to the ceiling, there is the distinct sound of a rusty pulley.
Wow. It seems that "The Thing" has gotten more press than JonBenet Ramsey!
I first saw the premier of the film at the Directors Guild of America, in Los Angeles. At Guild screenings they had only two rules: You were forbidden to leave before the movie ended, and you had to sit through all of the credits in support of the other unions. I have learned the good sense in this over the years, and I believe that everyone should do the same, out of begrudging respect, if nothing else. I recall that the audiences, consisting of 90% industry professionals, usually began talking about a film directly afterward. But after "The Thing," they could only manage to sit there in total shock. I loved it. They just weren't prepared to see such graphic and horrifying violence on the screen, and unfortunately all but a few gave it highly negative reviews. So I find it doubly gratifying that so many year later it only continues to gain the respect it so obviously deserved.
Btw, I also watched the "prequel" this year which I thought was a totally unnecessary attempt at nothing more than ripping off nearly every single key scene in the Carpenter classic. Worse still was in their hiring of one of the most bland and boring actresses ever in order to attempt to compete with Kurt Russell's commanding performance, a decision even worse that their plagiarizing of the original 'Thing' concept.
Jays favorite scene from the thing is the one that kept me up at night as a child
I like how the video starts with Jay making a bunch of jokes that pretty much says, "Remakes have been happening forever."
the 2011 version should have been called "from another world"
Ah one of my favorite monster flicks. Great pick.
Isn't that great though? It assimilated the good Thing movie, and created a copy. A disgusting copy out to destroy you.
Replaced the tension with action scenes. Covered the SFX with the CGI virus. All to invade you, and ruin it for you. Like the movie is The Thing itself.
They did that on purpose. They spent millions of dollars to fail just for the gag, and I commend them for it. That's commitment
CGI isn't bad in itself, it's just that almost nobody uses it properly anymore. In fact if John Carpenter's The Thing was made a decade later it would be using the same stop-motion technology that was invented for Jurassic Park used and would have used some CGI mixed in with practical effects for that final encounter in the basement much the same way CGI and practical effects are deftly used to bounce off one another properly in the T-Rex paddock attack scene.
The 2011 The Thing prequel was really bad for a lot of reasons and they went overboard and ruined all of that hard work with practical effects but there are definitely moments where use of CGI would've been appropriate. CGI should always be fleeting and intercut with shots of practical effects the 2011 prequel could've pulled that off in a few spots if some producer or whomever didn't decide to take a dump on it. Almost everybody who worked on that film did a real, genuine effort into making the film good, even the folks who did the CGI, and the movie was doomed due to the bad decisions of a handful of people. It's a real shame and it reminds me of the SciFi channel series that was going to be made based on the 1982 film never got it's feet off the ground. Those handful of people who make the bad decisions are often the same ones that are the only reason the film or tv show gets made in the first place.
thing 2011 would have sucked even if it was all practical since it was clear that the filmmakers weren't trying to recreate the paranoia and instead went to monster in your face
Ya it still wouldn't have been great but those original effects were REALLY good. It would have had at least something memorable.
Yeah but Ebert gave the star wars prequels a positive review.. I rather listen the opinion of those hacks at the VCR repair store rather than that fraud
He gave Speed 2 thumbs up....fucking Speed 2.
such a fantastic movie. Cannot recommend enough
In the first scene with the dog before the Norwegians land, there is a really good foreshadowing shot of the chopper of the Norwegians trying to kill the thing doggy and a very present chevron barrel with a flammable sticker (edit: furthermore it shows a good juxtaposition for the heavy blues and reds present in the film, after they go into blow up the camp everything turns red where before it was blue)
One of my favorites!
Greatest horror movie ever made, and it's not even close.
Yeah fuck you too is easily my favourite one liner
When you talk about 'unused music from The Thing used in The hateful eight' around 10:30 - I'm pretty sure that part of the music was used in the thing, namely in the scene where they fly to the site crashed UFO was and climb down the cliffs and Mac asks Doc (forgot his name) how long he thinks the thing was under the ice. Pretty sure that part plays right there.
Never noticed those things like lighting that you mentioned, need to find it somewhere and watch again
Another sin of the 2011 prequel. It did so poorly that it spooked Hollywood...and got Guillermo del Toro's 'Beyond the Mountains of Madness' cancelled.
Spooking investors is a thing in all studios...you need the money to make these films. It's not Hollywood, so much as the movie industry as a whole (not Indy so much, but you don't get big budget Indy films without investors either).
Ocrilat God damn I wouldve loved to see that
Roger "4.5 stars Revenge of the Sith" Ebert
"Yeah, fuck you too, Ebert!" 🧨🎇🎆✨
I'm glad you brought this up. Ebert really dated himself as the years went by. He truly showed some conceit in the '80s whenever any movie had even the slightest of gore. If you read his 4/4 star Phantom Menace review, he actually says he will forgive a weak story if it has imaginative visuals any day. And those visuals look terrible today. I think he was of that era to be impressed by now-dated CGI. Fine, but by slamming the mastercraft of The Thing's special effects, he really comes across as a huge hypocrite.
I think the 2011 fits really well. Watching them back to back is fun.
watched "the thing" (1982) for the first time today thanks to an anime girl called Pomu Rainpuff and wow was it an amazing movie!! After finishing it we decided to do another watchalong of this review, she loves RLM!
This review was the perfect way to digest the movie, Thank you!
Someone once told me that John Carpenter used his wives in all his movies in some way or another. I instantly said "There are no women in "The Thing". the person looked back at their phone for a second and said..." Oh, the computer." Macready pours a drink on it and call it a cheating bitch, lol.
It wasn't the producer that was unhappy with the effects. It was the Universal excecutives
About fucking time they did this. This is my favourite movie of all time.
Trifecta for movies during my college years, Escape from New York, The Thing, Dune, and a shitload of other great movies during the early 80s.
How are there dislike you can't watch it that fast
Canadaphobia
Because INSTANT TRASH. Get it?
Amazing, this movie (1982 version of course) still scares me to the point that I spent a good portion of this video, just listening without watching.
"Can't think of what I've done worthwhile ever" *awkward pause* GOLD XD
I love it when Jay hates on films. He's passionate and fucking brutal in the driest sense.
I probably like it more when he loves films. Enthusiasm, and much more insight. These are the times when I kinda learn things about films.
Someone pointed out somewhere that the theme song to John Carpenter's The Thing sounds almost like a human heartbeat, but just different enough to be off putting. Such a great little detail I had never noticed before.
I watched it tonight. I thought it WAS a heartbeat. I didn't notice ANY of the music besides those little beats and I didn't even realize that it was music.
Why can I not read more. Send help.
What does it mean if my heartbeat exactly matches up to the theme?
I actually just noticed this when hearing it in this review and actually focusing on it for probably the only time. John Carpenter is the fucking man.
What's really funny is that there's a very similar music used in some of the TOS episodes...
Between this and The Shining, I think it must have been illegal to give horror movies any respect.
Mostly the critics are right.
nah critics are conceited shitheads about those genres.
It's always the movies that affect you in some way that makes or breaks it for critics. When it came to these films, the content of them disturbed people so much that they just wrote it off as 'shock value', which is stupid.
It's like what Stephen King said about The Shining. "This is a movie made to hurt people," or something. If the movie succeeds at what it's aiming for, then that's a good thing! Movies that invoke real emotion in the viewer are good, damn it!
'Mainstream critics' are just pretentious jerkoffs that don't actually appreciate films they watch. Art direction, scores, shot composition, it doesn't matter to them. But that's what you should expect from the mainstream itself.
It's because horror is a very niche appeal. A lot of people don't like feeling scared or disturbed, so they pan movies that are actually scary while praising movies that are labeled 'horror' even if they actually aren't. The recent trend of horror movies over the past decade has been much more horrifying in how it's happened than any of the movies themselves.
@Bobby Peru To be fair, all you need to do is watch BOTW to kind of understand why. Horror and action are really open to exploitation, so I can kind of understand why critics might think this movie is just trying to capitalize on shock value and gore effects.
They saw those, which are typical of exploitative b-movies, and made assumptions about the intent of the director rather than judging the film on it's own merits. But you know what happens when you assume...
one of my favorite aspects of this movie: zero subplot. no romantic interests, no scheming.. the entire movie is so focused I love it.
@@electricfishfan Oppressive is a good description, this is one of the most 'atmospheric' movies I've seen.
Common trait of most classic movies. They're relatively simple and focused.
If Stephen King wrote this, it wouldve had:
a human bully,
a team member with psychic ability
the Thing wouldve been an "elemental demon"
it wouldve taken place in a lighthouse in Derry, Maine where the team is cut off due to a hurricane and flooding.
@@zarreff that kind of sounds like john carpenter’s the fog
@@zarreff it would also have flashbacks to when they all hung out as kids
Fun fact. If you are norwegian, swedish or danish the fact that the dog is a monster is revealed in the first minutes of the movie. The desperate scientist in the beginning litherally screams "the dog is a monster" in norwegian(not that it isnt kind of obvious that something is weird, but still).
So does he scream "the dog is a monster" in english for the norwegian dub?
Norwegians dont dub. Most speak english, the rest use subtitles
Guts we dont dub movies in the nordic countries. Atleast not in normal movies. Mostly only childrens movies.
We don't dub, that's a German thing. Actually, the reason we Scandinavians all know English may be linked to that fact. Sadly they dub kids material now...
Øystein A. The simpsons movie in swedish still haunts me till this day
Jay, don't sell yourself short on never doing anything. You made everyone say "Very cool" for nearly two weeks
VERY cool
And I always make remarks about THe hOrsEy SauCe when I go to arby's!
Update from the future. We are still saying Very Cool
I thought he would have been more famous for everyone spouting off his line of "Don't ask questions. Just consume product and get excited for next product."
@@sirquaffler542 Me personally, I believe it broke new ground.
Edit: Which is very cool
The real reason the Thing crash landed on Earth: it heard this was the one place it could find a good Chess Wizard.
dethcon5002 and when it heard Kurt Russel fried it, The Thing began killing everyone off. Good lore, 10/10.
Hah! You made me spit out my water.
And it was wrong
Because it’s a cheating bitch
it's a well known fact that alien shapeshifters have a weakness for blended whiskey...
We all fucking know he came for the pinball wizard dude come on idk if you’re trolling or not but it’s the PINBALL WIZARD that the thing needs to stop focusing on.
The pinnacle of horror movies. What a small team of artists achieved here with practical effects hasn't been surpassed by rooms filled with CGI artists on computers. Much like Rich Evans, it gets creepier every time I watch it. :-D
moniek And The Thing is pretty creepy too! 😉
Andrew K - why shouldn't every comment mention Rich Evans?
Truth!
yea the more I watch Rich Evens, he get creepier XD
Michael Mercy Couldn't be said any better. Every bit of The Thing is thoroughly unsettling and visually nothing short of breathtaking.
The delay in filming really forced Carpenter to spend more time evaluating characters and considering the story than he normally would, which is I think why it came out so much better. I imagine if Alaska had been clear at the time, we may have gotten a much more typical Carpenter film.
PlagueOfGripes draw some thing lewds
Woah, never thought I'd see you here plague
thanks daddy gripes! is there any new creppy trivia about farm animals that you can share with us?
But how strong is the Thing, Plague?
Red Sparrow Not stronger than Paige
Through it all, I think what warms my heart the most about the film is that Carpenter finally got to see his favorite movie get the respect it deserved. It took a couple of decades, but he's alive to see and know just how beloved The Thing's become over the years.
True. Must feel good. The money would have been nice though of course.
@@theeternalnow6506 they wrote him a fact check every time they remade one of his movies. he's doing fine making music with his sons.
@@namelesswalaby True, but The Thing flopped hard in its day, commercially and critically, and it wasn't particularly profitable for him either, so he was actually pretty bitter about all that for a long while.
There was some other director, or a writer, who had lunch with him back in maybe the 80s or 90s, and the wanted to mention how much he loved The Thing and what an excellent movie it was, and how Carpenter should be so proud of it, but Carpenter kind of just dismissed that praise because it bombed, he felt that it didn't really mean much.
I can only imagine that it must have felt extremely cathartic and vindicating that the movie gradually grew to be rightfully recognized as the masterpiece that it actually is, especially with how everyone else on the film crew really put their best effort in too.