Be afraid of.. The Thing

 

Horror Movie Challenge – #3 The Thing

For the 3rd film I chose to see in the Horror Movie Challenge, The Thing was one I went into blindly, and so ‘the Thing’ as a title really summed it up. I didn’t know if it was alien, a virus, a ‘monster’, or.. what. The cover also didn’t sum it up too well, and on the back I just saw lots of bearded men from the early 80s led by Mr Goldie Hawn, Kurt Russell.

Made in the same year as Poltergeist, in terms of how dated it is in the year 2010 – it holds up pretty well, if we are to compare it to my 1st challenge flick.

The film takes place in the Antarctic as a group of scientists are holed up, researching and playing loads of table tennis, and keeping themselves entertained in the loads of spare time they find themselves with.

The action starts almost immediately, with a helicopter circling the compound – taking aim maliciously at a dog, running for its life. It then escalates even as the helicopter land, and the two occupants disembark with guns drawn, and fire upon the men at the base with no provocation. Turns out they were on a nearby base – but why would they attack? Kurt, and the Captain go to investigate finding bloodshed and an abandoned base.

Outside, its almost even worse with burning corpses, smoldering flesh and bones. As you would in that situation – they take one back to base to investigate further.

Its not pretty. And its not human. Hard to describe, it has a double head. Or an extension of one head, all stretched out and mutated.

From here on in, the undercurrents of the territorialism between certain characters, as well as the cabin fever which would no doubt set in after a long time on 1 of two remote continents come out. And fiercely as the ‘Thing’ infests, invades and makes itself known to the compound. It takes the form of a dog at first, then comes out (worse than ‘Aliens’ coming out of someone’s stomach) and attacks.

The suspense is brilliant, and the gore isn’t so overdone that it happens every 5 minutes – it just escalates until BAM! An exploding and expanding head is in your face – and what do you do? Set a flare to it! Its paced beautifully, with the suspense, action and horror hand in hand with an ending that leaves you wanting more, and ends logically and beautifully. Ambiguous enough that it could lead to a sequel, or it might not. An ending that is just in the right place for it not to piss the viewer off by not giving a resolution.

I really quite enjoyed this and so far am proud of it to be in my collection! Meanwhile, can’t get rid of Suspiria fast enough!

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