40 years of ‘The Thing’, John Carpenter: terror has no form

The director was already considered one of the greatest innovators of fantasy and horror cinema. ’13. ‘Attack on the District Police Station’ had become a minor cult piece, ‘The Fog’ and ‘1997: Rescue in New York’ were two of the founding titles of the new fantasy film, and above all, ‘Halloween night’ proposed a radical reversal of perspective on the genre.as well as the revival of the ‘slasher’ variant.

15 million €

All these Carpenter titles were B-series productions, to which we had to add his very cheap debut, ‘Dark Star’, the television ‘biopic’ about Elvis Presley, and a stimulating television movie with Hitchcockian roots called ‘Someone Spying Me’. ‘La cosa’, which he made in 1982, had a scope of production that he could not have imagined until then: 15 million euro budget Compared to the 307,000 euros that ‘Halloween night’ cost, or the less than six million invested in ‘1997: Rescue in New York.

In addition, the director can directly realize his commitment. one of the classics Hollywood What did he always appreciate most?, Howard Hawks. For Carpenter, Hawks’ most iconic western, ‘Río Bravo’, is one of the best films in the history of cinema and a view shared by Quentin Taratino. Carpenter always wanted to do a remake of ‘Río Bravo’, but because he didn’t have the money to make a Western, he recreated the basic situation of that western with John Wayne and Dean Martin – a small space besieged by some bad guys – ’13. In the attack on the district police station is in the key of the city police.

external threat

He succeeded with ‘La cosa’ Direct adaptation of ‘Mystery of another world’ (1951) was a science fiction movie featuring a menacing creature from outer space in the midst of the cold war, so it accepted both pro-communist and anti-communist readings like ‘Body thieves invasion’.

The film was produced and supervised by Hawks, who entrusted the production to its regular editor, Christian Nyby. Many aspects of the plot – professionalism, teamwork, beleaguered space – were ‘Hawksian’.

Carpenter made his version that highlights some aspects of the threat and introducing elements of his time, such as viruses and infections. In one of the most memorable scenes from ‘The Thing’, a group of scientists from an Antarctic station take a blood test to find out if anyone has ‘thing’ inside: the terror of infections, but also the terror of infections. Fear of not knowing if the person next to you is really who he says he isone of the fantastic cool themes.

Both the Hawks production and Carpenter’s film, ‘Who’s Going There?’, a novel by Don A. Stuart (pseudonym of John W. Campbell Jr.) published in the August 1938 issue of ‘Analogue science fiction and reality’ magazine. It is based on e. . In the story, researchers at the base discover a large spaceship with an alien buried in the ice. In their attempt to lift the ship, they eventually destroy it, but not the creature that turns into the ship. a multiform threat that can live in human or canine bodies.

From Elvis to Antarctica

After playing the king of rock in ‘Elvis’ and the one-eyed and sarcastic adventurer Snake Plissken in ‘1997: Rescue in New York’, Kurt Russell is back to put himself under the command of the director to give life to the leader of the team.. They would repeat in ‘Coup in Little China’ and ‘2013: Rescue in Los Angeles’. Carpenter’s usual cinematographer, Dean Cundey, knew how to go from the exhausting whiteness of snowy landscapes to the suggestion of what is and is not seen. The soundtrack was written by Ennio Morricone, but the truth is that the Italian composer delivered a note very similar to Carpenter’s own famous musical style.

In 2011, Dutchman Matthijs van Heijningen Jr., who brought a different approach to the subject with both the ‘remake’ and pre-film of Carpenter’s film ‘The Thing’. it happened. There’s also a sequel in video game format, ‘The thing’, which was released in 2002.