THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM. READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
In all honesty, you just don’t know who to trust when you need it the most. If you think not, look at The Thing.
PLOT
Based on John W Campbell Jr.’s Who Goes There?, first adapted in 1951 (The Thing from Another World), the film takes place in Antarctica. A helicopter pursues a sled dog to an American research station where a 12 man research crew is preparing for the winter. The members include: Helicopter Pilot RJ MacReady, Senior Biologist Blair, Physician Dr Copper (Richard Dysart), Geologist Vance Norris (Charles Hallahan), Assistant Biologist Fuchs (Joel Polis), Chief Mechanic Childs, Assistant Mechanic Palmer (David Clennon), Meteorologist George Bennings (Peter Maloney), Dog Handler Clark (Richard Masur), Station Commander Garry (Donald Moffat), Radio Operator Windows (Thomas G Waites) and Nauls the cook (TK Carter). When an unnamed Norwegian pilot lands near the base, it attempts to shoot the same dog, but is shot down in self defense by Garry. When MacReady and Copper scout the Norwegian base, they find it to be mostly destroyed, but also remains of a malformed humanoid. When Blair performs an autopsy, he surprisingly finds a normal set of human organs. After Clark kennels the sled dog that almost died, it quickly reveals its monstrous persona by absorbing the other station dogs. When the crew gets alerted of the disturbance, Childs destroys it with a flamethrower and saves the remaining dogs. Blair does an autopsy on the dog beast and deduces that it was capable of imitating organisms. With the data recovered from the Norwegian base, it leads to MacReady, Palmer & Norris finding an excavation site and discover an alien spacecraft that had to have been buried for thousands of years. Blair quickly becomes paranoid when running a computer simulation that the extraterrestrial infect all of life on Earth within a few years. The alien humanoid is able to assimilate Bennings, but MacReady quickly kills him upon discovery. The remaining crew even imprisons Blair when he destroys the radio, kills the remaining dogs and sabotages the vehicles. MacReady would then take command when the others lose faith in Garry’s leadership. He then finds Fuchs’ corpse outside the station, realizing that he took his life to avoid being assimilated. Nauls draws suspicion that he could be another thing when finding torn clothes in his shack. When the team debates on allowing him to remain leader, MacReady breaks into the station and keeps everyone at bay with dynamite. The commotion causes Norris to have a heart attack. When Copper attempts to defibrillate him, he quickly dies in the hands of Norris when revealing his alien self as well, resulting in MacReady to incinerate him as well. He even kills Clark who tries to snatch his gun from him. He later decides to perform a blood test to figure out who else is an alien, leading to him killing both Palmer and Windows when the former infects the latter. With Childs left on guard, MacReady, Nauls and Garry check on an isolated Blair to test him next, only to see him escaped. When they tend to confront him making his own spacecraft, they quickly find themselves confused when noticing Childs running off into the storm. Just as that happens, the station’s power generator is destroyed, which eliminates the needed heat for the remaining men. The remaining three agree that Blair can’t escape, resulting in them to set explosives around the station. When they separate, Nauls disappears and Blair kills Garry, transforming into its most enormous state yet. However, MacReady is still able to destroy the remaining thing and the station once he triggers the explosives. Just as he sits by the remnants, Childs returns, claiming to have gotten lost when pursuing Blair. The film ends with the remaining two men, wary of each other, waiting for the weather to consume them as they share their last bottle of Scotch whisky.
THOUGHTS
There have been many films in this genre that shake you to the core, but I don't think anyone does it like this. Thanks to Ennio Morricone composing a bone chilling score, you're immediately on edge before shit hits the fan. This movie works so well because Director John Carpenter and Writer Bill Lancaster create an intelligent whodunnit where you're never really sure who somebody really is. It unlocks the paranoia that the people we trust are not what they appear and you have to figure it out before betrayal occurs. And with that, we straight up the holy grail showcase of practical effects in the hands of Rob Bottin. He basically created a new form of nightmares beyond comprehension whenever we see the Thing. The fact that it is always a different form the next thing, grotesque or not, is what drove me crazy. And every time it chose to violently attack, I'm always caught off guard. I'm still badly flinching whenever it chooses to do so. This thing had the goal to conquer and you find yourself relieved to not see it succeed. The craziest fact though is that it is not the ultimate threat, but the paranoia it evokes towards its victims, how it releases the monsters within. It does its job on letting fear overtake them to make it easier assimilating them. Speaking of which, each cast member nails the accent of attending to appear innocent, only to be a sadistic creature in the blink of an eye. Out of 12 actors though, it goes down to three that leave the biggest impression on me. Blair is the first that comes to mind because that is how unsure I was of him with each viewing. Wilford Brimley brings pure ambiguity by expressing the character's paranoia, only to discover it as a facade for seeing the alien trying to be steps ahead of its prey. I mean he even told them to watch out for Clark to keep the heat off of him. The only one that we naturally root for in this hell fest is the one with the most common sense that is MacReady. At first, Kurt Russell makes him appear a little cynical, but in reality, this is a smart guy who is willing to do anything possible to survive, which is something you can't help but respect, especially since that helped him make it to the end. However, one other man gives his all to survive, that is Childs. Whenever Keith David was onscreen, he portrayed him as one with the biggest chip on his shoulder, which resulted in having such a short temper in comparison to the others. And due to not seeing eye to eye to MacReady in the first place, it made it harder to trust him. I hate to say it because I don't like to sound like a bandwagon, but I do agree with the theory that he is another thing due to the fact alone of no fog appearing when he breathes/speaks. If this is true, then I pray for MacReady to overcome one last obstacle. This film may get better every time, but even that doesn't excuse the issues I noticed when re watching. Like for instance, why the hell did MacReady destroy Chess Wizard? That was a dope game meant for everyone and if there wasn't an alien, you'd be starting a spiral of cabin fever. Also, why weren't the bodies of Clark and Doc burnt up? Even if they weren't assimilated before death, no one should be taking risks like that and should have instead eliminate all possibilities. Other than that, this one is still thrilling to get through. In short, 1982's The Thing is a horror masterpiece for knowing exactly how to get inside your head and keep you on edge. You want a film that'll test your mind? This'll do it for you.
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