Repugnant remake does boast macabre showmanship...

Rating: 2/10 (23 March 2009)

John Carpenter's nightmarish variation on the well-regarded 1951 chiller "The Thing From Another World" features a colorless cast of macho dullards led by Kurt Russell who tangle with unseen enemy at an Antarctic outpost. Overloaded with gross-out special effects, the movie seems destined to appeal mainly to connoisseurs of splatter-cinema (and, in that regard, it was somewhat ahead of its time). Carpenter, working from a weak screenplay, does all he can to raise shudders with the minimal material, but his atmospherics are disappointing, as are the performances. Still, the outlandishness of the violence stays with one--it's memorably disgusting. *1/2 from ****