The Thing(1982)

John Carpenters 1982 remake  The Thing.In the vein of Alien with exceptional over the top gore and special effects by artists Rob Bottin and Stan Winston taking horror to new heights!!! Great film definitely worth a late night viewing .                               

4.5/5


http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x65m5i_thing_shortfilms

John Carpenter’s The Thing
Film poster by Drew Struzan
Directed by	John Carpenter
Produced by	David Foster Lawrence Turman (Producers) Wilbur Stark (Executive Producer) Stuart Cohen (Co-Producer)
Written by	Novella: John W. Campbell, Jr. Screenplay: Bill Lancaster
Starring	Kurt Russell Wilford Brimley Keith David David Clennon Donald Moffat Thomas G. Waites Joel Polis Peter Maloney Charles Hallahan T. K. Carter Richard Dysart Richard Masur
Music by	Ennio Morricone John Carpenter (Uncredited)
Cinematography	Dean Cundey
Editing by	Todd C. Ramsay
Distributed by	MCA / Universal Pictures
Release date(s)	June 25, 1982 (1982-06-25)
Running time	109 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$15,000,000
Gross revenue	$18,782,838
Followed by	The Thing (prequel film)

The Thing is a classic 1982 science fiction horror film directed by John Carpenter, written by Bill Lancaster, and starring Kurt Russell. The film's title refers to its primary antagonist: a parasitic extraterrestrial lifeform that assimilates other organisms and in turn imitates them. It infiltrates an Antarctic research team, taking the appearance of the researchers that it kills, and paranoia occurs within the group.
Ostensibly a remake of the 1951 Howard Hawks-Christian Nyby film The Thing from Another World, Carpenter's film is a more faithful adaptation of the novella Who Goes There? by John W. Campbell, Jr. which inspired the 1951 film.^[1] Carpenter considers The Thing to be the first part of his Apocalypse Trilogy,^[2] followed by Prince of Darkness and In the Mouth of Madness. Although the films are unrelated, each feature a potentially apocalyptic scenario; should "The Thing" ever reach civilization, it would be only a matter of time before it takes over the Earth.
The theatrical performance of the film was poor.^[3] The poor opening has been attributed to many factors, including Steven Spielberg's E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, which was released at the time and features a more optimistic view of alien visitation. However, The Thing has gone on to gain a cult following with the release on home video. It was subsequently novelized in 1982, adapted into a comic book miniseries published by Dark Horse Comics, and was followed by a video game sequel in 2002, with a movie prequel currently in the works.

Plot

In winter 1982, an American Antarctic research station is alerted by gunfire and explosions. Pursued by a Norwegian helicopter, an Alaskan Malamute makes its way into the camp as the science station's crew looks on in confusion. Through reckless use of a thermite charge, the helicopter is destroyed and its pilot killed shortly after landing. The surviving passenger fires at the dog with a rifle, grazing Bennings (Peter Maloney), one of the researchers. The passenger is shot and killed by Garry (Donald Moffat), the station commander. Not knowing what to make of the incident, the station crew adopts the dog.
Unable to contact the outside world via radio, helicopter pilot R.J. MacReady (Kurt Russell) and Copper (Richard Dysart) risk a flight to the Norwegian camp to find it destroyed, its personnel missing or dead. Finding evidence that the Norwegians had dug something out of the ice, the pair return to the station with the partially-burned remains of a hideous creature which bears some human features. An autopsy of the cadaver by Dr. Blair (Wilford Brimley) is inconclusive, save to find that the creature had what appeared to be a normal set of internal organs.
At Bennings' request, the station's dog-handler, Clark (Richard Masur), kennels the stray with the rest of the station's sled dogs. Noises from the kennel cause Clark to return, finding almost the entire sled team in the process of being assimilated by the stray dog, which has transformed into a monster. MacReady summons the crew to the kennel and orders Childs (Keith David) to incinerate the creature with a flamethrower. A subsequent autopsy by Blair reveals that the stray dog was an alien capable of absorbing and perfectly imitating other life-forms. Realizing the implications of this, Blair quickly becomes withdrawn and suspicious of the others. A second helicopter expedition discovers an alien spacecraft unearthed by the Norwegian research team, revealing that the creature had awakened after being buried within the ice for thousands of years.
Bennings and Windows (Thomas G. Waites) quarantine the remains of the dog-creature and the Norwegian cadaver in the storage room, but moments after leaving, Windows returns to discover Bennings being assimilated. The crew burns the Bennings replica before its transformation is complete. Determining that all life on Earth would be assimilated in just over three years if the creature were to reach another continent, Blair goes berserk, destroying the helicopter and radio, and killing the remaining sled dogs, containing further contamination. The team overpowers him and confines him in the tool shed. With all contact to the outside world cut off, the crew wonders how to determine who is still human. Paranoia quickly sets in as the first attempt to develop a test using uncontaminated blood samples is sabotaged by an unknown party.
Fuchs (Joel Polis), attempting to continue Blair's research, goes missing shortly afterwards during a power failure. While searching for Fuchs' body, MacReady comes under suspicion and is locked outside in a severe blizzard. Somehow finding his way back to camp without a guide line, MacReady breaks into a storage room and threatens the rest of the crew with dynamite. In the course of the standoff, Norris (Charles Hallahan) suffers a heart attack. When Copper attempts to revive him by defibrillation, Norris' body transforms and kills Copper. Norris' head detaches from his body and attempts to escape as the others burn the body, leading MacReady to theorize that every piece of the alien is an individual animal with its own survival instinct. In an altercation that precedes a test proposed by MacReady, Clark tries to stab MacReady with a scalpel, who shoots and kills him. The rest of the crew complies with the test; blood samples are drawn from each member of the team and jabbed with a hot wire to see whose blood will react defensively. Palmer (David Clennon), the backup pilot, is unmasked as an imitation, and manages to kill Windows before being destroyed by MacReady, who also torches Windows' body with a flamethrower as it begins to transform.
Confirming that MacReady, Childs, Garry, and Nauls (T.K. Carter) are still human, the surviving crew set out to administer the test to Blair, only to find that he has escaped. After they discover that Blair had been constructing a small flying craft of alien design underneath the tool shed and witness Childs inexplicably abandoning his post at the main gate, the facility loses power. Realizing that the creature now wants to freeze again so a future rescue team will find it, the remaining crew acknowledge that they will not survive and set about destroying the facility in hopes of killing the creature. While setting explosives in the underground generator room, Garry is killed by the infected Blair. Nauls follows the sounds of the creature and is never seen again. Alone, MacReady prepares to detonate the charges when the creature, larger than ever, emerges from beneath the floor. MacReady kills it with a stick of dynamite, which sets off the rest of the charges and destroys the entire facility.
After some time, MacReady is shown wandering alone in the flaming rubble. He encounters Childs, who claims to have seen Blair and gotten lost while chasing him in the snow. With the polar climate closing in around them, they acknowledge the futility of their distrust, sharing a drink as the camp burns.