The 1982 version of The Thing needs no introduction "“ it's John Carpenter's finest achievement, a firecracker of a film loaded with Cold War suspicion, a snarling Kurt Russell and that "OMGWTF!" blood test scene. If you haven't seen it, forty lashes.
A prequel to the 1982 classic, this year's Thing kicks off with a couple Americans joining up with a team of Norwegians in Antarctica to excavate someThing (see what I did there?) of unparalleled importance. Aforementioned Thing escapes its block of ice, begins mimicking its prey and the hunt begins. It moves quickly.
I'm not here to compare this to the 1982 film. They aren't in the same ballpark. But The Thing is surprisingly entertaining. The CGI effects range from spectacular to laughable, depending entirely on the amount of lighting used. When the Thing is busting out of someone's face in broad daylight, it looks a little overdone, but the first incarnation of the monster is genuinely chilling. This ain't no PG-13 AvP.
When our monster isn't killing people, the actors are serviceable. Winstead has the unfortunate responsibility of spelling out every frickin' detail about what the Thing does and it's forced and inorganic. The sense of immediacy and danger isn't all there either, but by the time you start rolling your eyes, another person gets creatively torn to shreds and you're back in it. To its credit, this Thing does have a "blood test" scene that works much better than you'd expect. The tension can be pretty overwhelming at times.
The Thing doesn't quite terrify like it used to with CGI replacing the puppetry and practical effects work that made the original so gut-wrenching. It falls prey to genre expectations too often as well, resorting to having the Thing stalk through a room off-screen while the humans twist silently around corners. But the ending is a gamble, boldly throwing audience expectations out the window, and I ate it up. Enjoy it for what it is and you shouldn't be too disappointed.
