This summer, fans of The Thing can enjoy the original John Carpenter film as was meant to be – on the big screen. According to SlashFilm, the news broke on the director’s Twitter feed — he even provided a link to buy tickets — and we couldn’t be more excited.
The 74-year-old Halloween and Escape from New York director states in a video on Twitter:
“I loved making this movie, and I’m so excited that people can celebrate it and see it in theaters 40 years later.”
The 1982 remake of the 1951 horror film, The Thing from Another World starred Kurt Russell and Wilford Brimley. Being a remake, there was a danger of gilding the lily, but the genre stepped up its game in this iteration of the story. John Carpenter masterfully created and maintained the morose tone of the film. The brutality of it is practically unmatched in cinema when you factor in the fear and isolation those men would have felt.
Not a major commercial success, that hasn’t stopped the film from growing a fanbase as cinephiles have continued to sing its praises. The love of the film has spawned fan theories over the years, and the somewhat equivocal faceoff at the end only adds to its mystique.
We certainly hope that this is a new trend, as our favorite classics deserve a Renaissance on the big screen. Some great options also have their 40th anniversaries coming up this year: Fast Times at Ridgemont High, 48 Hours, and Poltergeist, to name a few. Just imagine the Alamo Drafthouse menu selections: the “Billy Bear” Black Russian, “They’re Here” steak-and-chicken-combo, and “Our Time” pizza.
