Review: The Thing (2011)

In 1982, palaeontologist Mary Elizabeth Winstead is abruptly called upon to join a team of Norwegian scientists to a station in the Antarctic. Apparently an otherworldly discovery has been made, buried in ice for a hundred thousand years. Soon they also uncover an alien creature similarly buried in ice, which they take back to their base for study. The ice melts, the creature springs to life and proceeds to bump off the scientists and accompanying chopper pilots one by one. Apparently it is able to absorb human bodies and duplicate them, making it difficult to tell who is human and who is not. Let the paranoia begin! Joel Edgerton and Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje play pilots, Ulrich Thomsen is the head scientist of the expedition, with Eric Christian Olsen his assistant.

Although it boasts an interesting concept, I’ve never been a fan of this story. The original 1951 film “The Thing from Another World” was a crushing bore, John Carpenter’s celebrated 1982 remake “The Thing” boasted great FX but no interesting characters and zero tension or interest. Truth be told, I’ve always preferred “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”, particularly the unnerving 1978 version. So when I tell you that this 2011 film from debut feature director Matthijs van Heijningen Jr. is the best of the three films connected to the John W. Campbell Jr. short story (Who Goes There), bear in mind that fans of either the 1951 version and/or the 1982 version might strongly disagree with me. In fact, they might want to beat the crap out of me (Please don’t. You wouldn’t hit a guy with glasses and in a wheelchair, would you?). It’s still no “Body Snatchers”, but I definitely found myself interested in at least a couple of the characters here, and that’s more than I can say for either previous version.

 

This one comes billed as a prequel to the Carpenter film, but I call bullshit on that. It’s a remake, but with some Norwegian characters added who may or may not have some connection to the Norwegian characters who encountered the title creature before Kurt Russell and co. showed up at the beginning of Carpenter’s film. Actually, that’s not fair. Scenes towards the end suggest a tie to the 82 film, but I think that’s a bit tacked-on, really. It’s just a remake in prequel’s clothes. **** SPOILER WARNING **** If you leave before the end credits have started, you’ll actually miss the connection almost entirely, so obviously even the director doesn’t care all that much about making this a real prequel. Why only add that after the film is over, if it’s so important? Because it’s not. **** END SPOILER **** Things (sorry!) get even murkier as the film begins with a Universal logo not from the early 80s but from the 90s, for a film supposedly set in 1982! Then again, the film is also from Morgan Creek (whose logo you would’ve seen attached to films like “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves”, “Young Guns”, and “Young Guns II”), who I thought went bust about a decade or so ago, which is weird too. Things pick up a bit when the familiar notes of Ennio Morricone’s score from the Carpenter film make a distinct appearance in the score here by Marco Beltrami (“Scream”, “Dracula 2000”, “Repo Men”). I felt Morricone’s work was some of his least interesting and least inspired, but nonetheless, the familiar throbbing beats here brought a smile to my face. Hell, even the opening titles are done in a fairly close approximation of Carpenter’s (Especially at the end).

 

There’s no doubt in my mind that a large percentage of the reason why I gave at least half a crap about this film is due to the lead performance by Mary Elizabeth Winstead. She’s no great actress- hell, Kurt Russell is a much better actor, despite having an off day in 1982. Nonetheless, she’s a persuasive actress, and more importantly has genuine star quality and likeability on screen. I was absolutely smitten with her in “Scott Pilgrim vs. The World” (something about her ‘unattainability’ is somehow alluring), and she gives you someone to latch onto here. I tend to prefer her with blue hair, though. Joel Edgerton and Ulrich Thomsen are pretty solid too, but have far less to do (The latter reminds me of Julian Glover, by the way. Anyone else?).

The other thing that puts this film ahead of any previous version (aside from a quicker pace) is the cinematography by Michel Abramowicz (“Taken”), who is allowed to shoot outdoors a bit more than Carpenter afforded Dean Cundey, and the wonderful scenery really does help make things a lot less drab. It’s really well-lit, even in darkened scenes, something so many cinematographers these days tend to screw up. This may result in what some would lament as a lack of dread and oppression, but I never felt much of that in the previous films because the characters failed to have me invested enough in them anyway. Kurt Russell and co were a surly lot, and lacked any depth. Some would also say that this version isn’t scary, but once again, the previous films didn’t engage me enough in their characters or situation to get scared anyway. But yes, if pressed I have to admit this version lacks any terror. I was OK with that.

The FX by Rob Bottin were the highlight of the Carpenter film, and in this one the FX by (among others) Tom Woodruff Jr. are mostly pretty good. It’s not easy to seamlessly blend CGI and practical FX (Woodruff involved in the latter), but for the most part, they’ve pulled it off. They don’t reach the show-stopping heights of Bottin’s work, but perhaps part of the reason why those FX were such show-stoppers was because there wasn’t much of a show to stop, really. The alien/creature is interestingly unidentifiable, which in my opinion, is as it should be. Alien design often takes on a too familiar route for my liking. If aliens existed, I reckon they’d take on a form completely incomprehensible and unimaginable to humans. That’s almost impossible, then, to present on screen, but this film makes a decent stab at it, as did the 1982 film. In fact, these films might just have my favourite alien creations of all-time. The autopsy scene in particular, shows off far more realistic-looking FX than you might expect, whilst still being imaginative. It’s a bloody well done scene, and only on occasion does the CGI element become apparent (Oddly enough these are the moments that look most like Bottin’s work). Even when the FX do become apparent, they’re still interesting and creepy. I do think, however, that we get a few too many FX scenes, thus the impact gets lessened a little. Did they get a little too proud of their handiwork, perhaps? Unfortunately, the finale is a major letdown, especially on an FX level (The ending sucks too, but I’m not a fan of the ending of the Carpenter version, either, which is slightly different). We get computer FX straight out of 1992 and it’s all very silly. What a shame! But by and large, the FX were more of an asset than a problem for me.

If we’re talking about real problems, then just as was the case before, characters are the real flaw here. It’s nice that we have at least one character worth a damn, but the rest? Yawn. There are way too many characters and way too little development of those characters in the script by Eric Heisserer (the remake of “A Nightmare on Elm Street”, which was better than expected too). Thus, just as it failed to interest me in 1982, the film’s paranoia aspect is ineffectual. Not only that, but it’s awfully heavy-handed, once again a problem with the previous version.

 

Putting aside the 1951 film which was just flat-out stupefyingly boring, if the 1982 film was an average film with great FX, then this version is an OK film with good FX. I guess that adds up to being watchable, unless you’re a diehard fan of the Carpenter version. I just wish it had less characters and made a few more of the characters likeable or interesting.   

 

Rating: C+