Truly Terrifying but has a few flaws

Rating: 8/10 (16 April 2005)

John Carpenter's "The Thing" is my second favorite movie by him with the original "Halloween" being my favorite. The movie is filled with paranoia and isolation. The pace is a little slow sometime, but for the most part it moves effectively, starting at the beginning with a scene of nothing but white snow and mountains. After a moment you hear a helicopter and shooting, and suddenly a Husky comes into view, running from the people in the helicopter who are trying to kill it. I watched this movie when I was young, and seeing any kind of dog being shot at made me dislike the people in the helicopter.
The dog runs to another base where he is immediately saved and the Norwegians in the helicopter meet there demise with the helicopter blowing up and one of them being shot between the eyes. I almost cheered at seeing this. However, not long after, the dog is found creeping around the base as if stalking, and suddenly alarm bells went off in my head. Something was definitely not right with this innocent looking dog, and I began to understand why those Norwegians might have been trying to kill it. Soon after we find out why, and suddenly all heck breaks loose because that innocent looking dog was really an imitation of something much worse. A thing from outer space that could imitate any living creature.
I really don't have to say more, but this movie, which scared the crap out of me as a child, has some of the most gut wrenching and horrifying special effects ever. They still hold up well today and out do much of the CGI which now dominates films. Carpenter has once again shown how good he is at directing horror films, and Rob Bottin shows us more horrifying make-up effects then what he gave us in "The Howling." The sad thing though is I could never warm to any of the characters. MacCready, as played by Kurt Russel, was the only one I ever really cared about. The others were very cold, almost robotic. And the way they all seemed to go off so easily knowing that they could be imitated made them a little implausible as well.
Other than that, I would put this movie in my top 15 horror films. It would be in top 5 easily if the characters had all been more interesting, but the 1982 version of "The Thing" is, in my opinion, still a better movie than the 1951 original.