A Worthy Cult Classic

Rating: 8/10 (1 November 2019)

The Thing has become a cult classic over the years, but in case you've been living under a rock, it follows an American research team stationed in Antarctica as they're infiltrated by an alien lifeforce that imitates anything biological, including humans. It doesn't take long before the team realise the creature is around and could be anyone, and what follows is an hour and a half of paranoia and claustrophobia as the team splinters off in distrust of one another and are secretly and unknowingly picked off one-by-one.
Perhaps what The Thing is most well-known for are the special effects. In the age before CGI, everything had to be done practically, and The Thing's practical effects are nigh unmatched even today. The creature and its mutated remains are horrifying to look at, but so full of detail. Some moments maybe don't look quite as good, such as someone's head turned into a spider scuttling away, but others like a chest cavity suddenly opening up mid defibrillating and cutting a man's arms off are terrifyingly effective. The sheer breadth of these special effects are amazing as well, from a creature borne of a dog with flailing, whipping tentacles, to a face-eating humanoid, to a giant cave-filling monstrosity. It's a technical marvel and some of the goriest effects around, and compared to the prequel's CGI it shows how superior practical effects can be despite their limitations (case in point, the Xenomorph from Alien is scarier than the one from Covenant precisely because the limitations made it next to impossible to show the full creature in broad daylight).
But the gore and visual effects wizardry is only part of what makes The Thing such a landmark horror movie. What actually makes The Thing a true horror movie worthy of watching on Halloween is the isolation it portrays from the team's distrust of one another. Anyone could be the Thing. And often it's revealed to be the guy you didn't even suspect in the first place. The Thing is incredibly good at hiding and blending in with the group. And with everyone insisting they're human, does the imitation even realise they're an imitation? Would you know if you were an imitation and not yourself? The fact the movie never shows anyone actually being assimilated by the creature just amplifies it, and makes you wonder how the process actually takes place. Fear of the unknown is rampant in this movie.
My only real complaint would be some of the cuts can feel a bit janky. In order to keep the mystery intact and its cards close to the chest until the right moments, the passage of time never really feels well-defined. The best example of this would be when Fuchs talks to MacReady in the lab and seconds later is startled by a silhouette, follows it outside, finds tattered remains, and then we cut to MacReady mentioning how long Fuchs has been missing. There's no transition between these scenes to help the movie's flow of time. One minute he's there uncovering a potentially big piece of evidence, the next he's been missing for hours and no-one's bothered to look for him or check up on him. There isn't even any implication that he's been attacked, or even at risk of it, until we find his half-frozen, half-charred remains outside.
But I mean, there isn't really much more to say about it. It's claustrophobic and mysterious, with gory and disturbing special effects equal to none. Ennio Morricone's soundtrack is subdued and suitably creepy at all times, the use of muted colours to make the practical effects stand out is a subtle stroke of genius, and the ambiguity throughout goes a long way to build up the tension and the ultimate surprises. I give The Thing a solid 8/10. Would definitely recommend.