Nice idea, poorly realized, way overrated

Rating: 4/10 (20 June 2004)

(Contains minor spoilers)
I grabbed "The Thing" a few days ago, expecting a classic horror movie that I somehow managed to overlook before. Well, it turned out that I was wrong.
Even though the plot of an isolated research station in Antarctica provide a very nice basis for a horror movie, Carpenter didn't make much of it. At times, it became just too obvious that he simply tried to mix some ingredients of other (real) classics of that time, namely Scott's "Alien" and Kubrick's "2001", and then expecting to get a great movie. Which did not work.
On top of failing to provide any real new ideas (or even just special effects), the movie's storyline is very foreseeable. Plus, the characters do not act authentically - I don't buy that researchers shoot each other that easily or that they take the death of one of their colleagues that lightly ("well, he's been massacred by an alien monster, fine, let's burn and bury him and hope things will be fine").
Conclusion: 4/10 - only for die-hard Carpenter fans. Better watch "Alien" one more time.