The Thing (2011) – Movie Review

The Thing
Starring: Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Joel Egerton, Eric Christian Olsen
Director: Matthijs van Heijningen Jr.
Rated: R

In a remote Antarctica research station, a Norwegian crew discovers an Alien craft and its lone survivor.

While most assume that the story of “The Thing” was created in 1982 with the release of John Carpenters film “The Thing” starring Kurt Russell the story behind it was released in 1938 as a short story by John Campbell Jr., titled who goes there. The latest incarnation though some might consider a reboot of the 82 classic it is actually a prequel. The events that take place are the story of the Thule base prior to those of Kurt Russell’s character Mac.

The main themes of trust and isolation are covered in both, and the story lines are extremely similar although you can throw any small group of people in with a shape shifting Alien and you will pretty much get the same response, due to the limited variables alone. Purists will certainly say that the 82 version is superior and rightly so, it was made in an era without CGI and was forced to amp up the tension, Now my 12 year old neighbor could bang out some better special effects on his mac.

The downside with The Thing is given its material and Antarctica solitude it’s so predictable you will feel like you have seen it before from Mary Elizabeth Winstead’s channeling of Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley from the Alien Franchise to Joel Edgerton’s portrayal of Conner who is really just a revamp of Kurt Russells Character Mac from the Carpenter Version.

The one issue with the story is that the main lead Kate (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) a female graduate student, of all the people to bring to Antarctica as an Expert paleontologist I would hope they could come up with someone with a little bit more in the street cred department, We are talking the discovery of an alien craft and species; to have an actual expert as your expert seems to make some semblance of sense.

Where the film falls apart though is the ending, (Not the ending of the credits, nice way to lead into the JC version) but the main ending of the film. When Kate and Carter travel to the alien vessel Kate falls in and Carter goes after her. When they leave the ship Kate uses some quick logic and Burns Carter to a crisp, Now Carter burning is great, the fact that he is there in the first place is just stupid. If he was Normal Carter when he went after her but turned into thing Carter off camera, He would have just gone to the snowcat and left, rather than attempting to save Kate, on the flipside if it is Thing Carter that went towards the ship there are multiple times where he could have easily killed her and left. He never even had to take her to the ship. No matter which way you slice it Thing Carter should have killed her. It’s also rather ambiguous if Carter is actually a creature as he doesn’t turn into one when set on fire, Regardless the Thing creates an exact replica of a person including their memories and would not have fallen for such a stupid determination. The other gigantic plot whole is that the Thing travels back to the Alien ship and powers it up getting ready to leave Earth, Which completely destroys the entire premise of the Alien crashing and leaving the ship in the middle of nowhere and freezing, if the ship was capable of leaving in the first place why leave the ship?. Additionally the way that Kate suddenly takes over seems takes a huge leep of faith from the audience, the personalities of the type of person who would work at the station are not the type to listen to a Graduate student as the penultimate authority.

Overall there is enough Gore and burning bodies to keep things moving although a little disappointing in the lack of tension. There are a multitude of options to continue the franchise and eventually live up to its promise.

Grade-80