The Thing (1982)
With a considerably more gruesome take on the infiltration alien invasion movie, The Thing is directed by John Carpenter, from a screenplay by Bill Lancaster (The Bad News Bears).
Starring Kurt Russell, the story is based on the 1938 science fiction novella Who Goes There by John W. Campbell (writing as Don A. Stewart), and features a group of American researchers in Antarctica discovering that a Norwegian group has been decimated by an unseen force. They soon find that a parasitic alien lifeform – which assimilates and imitates other organisms – has infiltrated their isolated research station, and a severe storm is coming. Deep paranoia spreads quickly within the group as the alien absorbs their fellow researchers.
Though The Thing has found something of a dedicated following in the years since its release, it was poorly received in cinemas in 1982. Its gory body horror, as the alien makes itself known, sets the film as something of an oddity – being a monster movie without a monster really visible in its own right.
The central theme is timeless, however – being about prevention of an apocalypse, as the team fight to contain the threat and to prevent it spreading to populated areas, where it would surely and quickly consume humanity.
Published: Jul 9, 2014 01:05 pm