A Masterpiece of Sci-Fi and horror...a gift that keeps giving.

Rating: 10/10 (9 July 2009)

Now and then you find yourself looking up a personal favorite film on IMDb, both out of curiosity for it's score and to check out other viewer's comments.
Firstly let me say, that the current score of 8 for The Thing grossly misrepresents this extraordinary work - and as you wade from the reviews from the 90's to more recent.. you notice a sad slide from appropriate adulation by audiences who love cinema and recognize this horror masterpiece for what it is...to the current dregs, the typical 'its boring' kind of glib comments minuscule minds with microbial attention spans can only manage.
These withering mental midgets - the visually and dramatically ignorant, whose idea of character and suspense is gleaned from bad computer game dialog and garbage like Cloverfield where one dimensional characters (the kind they obviously identify with) are terrorized by absurd CGI monsters...all given the most obviously phony 'reality TV' style shaky cam to give it 'authenticity'.
The ultimate in fake...manufactured 'reality'.
But back to The Thing, which suffers none of those ills...part of the reason this film never found it's audience in the 80's was that it was released in the glow of one very friendly alien cheeseball known as ET. Carpenter's bleak meditation on paranoia and suspicion in a claustrophobic and isolated environment was simply way ahead of it's time and ill suited to the times. On the heels of Close Encounters and ET, audiences were perhaps enamored with the idea that aliens would be friendly cuddly creatures hoping to be our friends.
When you compare The Thing to quality contemporary horror such as Let The Right One In, it's easy to draw comparisons with the building suspense and isolation of The Thing - it's probably the most powerful reinvention of a horror story/film ever made.
Horror movies are a thrill ride in uncomfortable emotions..thats what they're for..people who complain about this film, simply don't like horror as a genre but are too stupid to realise it themselves. They want all their experiences watered down or handed on a platter.
From the pitch perfect acting, superb design, mindblowing and inventive physical effects by Bottin (where are you dude?, WE NEED YOU) and Winston, incredible throbbing drone of Morricone's theme...The Thing is the gift that keeps giving.' I must have watched it a good 20 times and never tire of the deft craft in play. The film delivers on two major fronts...both psychologically (who is the Thing?!!) and visually (some of the most boggling and crazy icky stuff committed to screen).
The Thing continues to deserve it's place toward the very top of ANY ultimate horror or sci-fi film list...26 years later, this film deserves to be honored by cinephiles, not derided by small uneducated minds whose tastes are more suited to the middle of the road in happy hopeful endings..