October Recommendation: The Thing

 

                                          My brother and I had our typical movie nights, and our choice of film was the Fog, which to make a long story short it was one of the most boring things we've ever witnessed. And my brother kept mentioning John Carpenter's the Thing and I though well long day at work recently purchased a subscription to Peacock, I figured might as well give this movie a watch. And I've never in a million years seen the movie I never quite seen the monster in terms of oh that's what the monster looks like and to be truthfully honest I never good a full frame of reference, in what this monster is I always figured it's something! Though I did catch some references that gave me a chuckle the infamous one is an episode of South Park where all the kids are giving samples of blood to see who has head lice, which now watching the film I was smiling a little. 

                                           In a remote Antarctica, a group of American research scientists are disturbed at their base camp by a helicopter shooting at a sled dog. When they take in the dog, it brutally attacks both humans and canines in the camp and they discover that the beast can assume the shape of its victims. A resourceful helicopter pilot (Kurt Russell) and the camp doctor (Richard Dysart) lead the camp crew in a desperate, gory battle against the vicious creature before it picks them off, one by one. 

                                           John Carpenter was told by Stephan King "the cliché's in Hollywood are that you never see the monster, you always keep the devil in the shadows, however if you can come up with something outstanding on screen you'll hit a home run out of the ball park and the audience will never forget it" For which leads us to how the Thing was developed. Like I said before I have never this movie never seen what the monster looks like so, just to make sure that everyone reading this review knows I've never seen this movie nor seen what the monster looks like which really I was watching this with open eyes, and this goes to when watching the first opening scene a helicopter is shooting at a sled Dog and I'm like why are these guys being such monsters in shooting a innocent dog and then slowly I become to realize oh, there's more to what is going on and I'm not going to give any detail's away because I want everyone to watch this film because it's excellent probably up there between Halloween and They Live as the best John Carpenter films I've seen. Unlike the Fog which after the first twenty minutes is pure boredom, the Thing does a fantastic job in incorporating a lot of paranoia throughout the movie to the point where your locked in with a bunch of people and you’re not sure who is who is just pure genius especially when their trying to figure out who is infected via taking samples of blood in order to see who is who while creating a ton of tension which again is just pure greatness, the other thing in what I love about the movie is that it takes a lot of inspiration from Ridley Scott's Alien where it only focuses on just these group of people out in the middle of nowhere and they build a horror movie around it. Furthermore what makes this movie great is that it ends the film in a way where you don't need a sequel where you can tell how this was going to end and you feel satisfied by the final frame, and the fact that back in 2011 they made a prequel about the film it's just well I have no interest in wanting to watch that film at all even if it star's Joel Edgerton, and really the Thing deserves a ton credit for its satisfying ending of you don't need any more Thing sequels so, deep down you all can just forget that there was a prequel this amazing treasure. I've never seen a whole lot of Kurt Russell's films from when he was a young buck and it's nothing out of disrespect I just never got around to seeing them but this film I have to say Kurt Russell does a great job being a bada**  and Keith David whose had a bad rap of playing "that guy does a great job with this movie as well that hopefully everyone after seeing the Thing you should also check out They Live which is another great movie he's in also be sure to check out Rick and Morty because he does play the President as well. I would say that this movie not doing well at the box office in America is a crime against humanity though sure it was going up against a ton of films like E.T. and Poltergeist but come on people have a heart this is like the crown jewel of scary movies done right hell can't be worse than watching the Fog. I'm going to cut myself off in terms of talking about how good the Thing is because granted I talk to much but if you’re looking for a scary movie to watch in the Halloween seasons or in the final days of October I would highly recommend watching the Thing, for many reasons it has a great list of actors, great suspense and John Carpenter creating something new with alien monsters that is almost a breath of fresh air.