The Problem with Things like these.

The Thing

Starring: Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Joel Edgerton, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Ulrich Thomsen, Eric Christian Olsen and Trond Espen Seim.

Directed by Matthijs van Heijningen.

1982 was a vintage year for Sci Fi films Star Trek 2 the Wrath of Khan, Blade Runner, ET, The Dark Crystal and John Carpenter’s The Thing. Nowadays you won’t get that kind of films these days most of them are remakes and adaptations of TV shows and comics. But Star Trek was there first.

Under a clouded memory, I was five at the time and watching ET at the cinema, I read the comic adaptation of Blade Runner though but I never saw the Thing until my teenage years and the VHS cover is the first thing that comes to mind when I think about the film.Having seen the prequel just recently, I’ve got ambivalent thoughts about it.

The film expands on the 82 original with Scott Pilgrim’s Mary Elizabeth’s Winstead playing feisty paleontologist, Kate Lloyd whose part of a bunch of ill fated Norwegian scientists who discover an alien corpse encased in the North Pole. After attempting a post mortem on the creature, but it escapes and soon people’s bodies start contorting and faces start falling off in unexpected ways which followed by an unearthly scream.. Cue paranoia and flamethrowers!

(Norman's plan to have his wisdom tooth out went horribly wrong)

Compared to the John Carpenter’s creature flick which focused more on tensions between Kurt Russell’s Mac Ready and his research crew, director Matthijs van Heijningen has opted for a lack of tension which was an essential part of the follow up. Instead he’s gone for the gore instead, despite it being visually impressive, I can’t help but think about the SFX achieved by Rob Bottin and Stan Winston back then.

The best thing about this one is the performances from Winstead who plays a calm and collected scientist thrown into a situation where no one trusts each other and yet still keeps her cool. Australian actor Joel Edgerton, better known as young Uncle Owen in the Star Wars prequels is a gruff Vietnam vet, Sam Carter who could almost be seen as a prototype of the character played by Russell almost thirty years ago.

The star turns by the leads save this film and Heijningen adds a coda that’s echoes the ending to Brett Ratner’s Red Dragon. The thing is(no pun intended) it feels like a retread of what John Carpenter did previously. On this prequel, I’m confident that younger audiences will get a few thrills out of it but I’d rather have something substantial.

Posted: 2/12/2011
Categories: Movies / Reviews

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