John Carpenter's The Thing (1982)

This theatrical poster for  The Thing was designed by Drew Struzan.

   The Thing directed by John Carpenter is well-known as one of the best horror films ever made. After viewing it in its entirety for the first time, I can clearly see why. The Thing is a disgusting, gruesome, grisly movie full of really shocking and gross special effects. And that made it a lot of fun to watch! I thoroughly enjoyed watching this movie, and that's thanks to the awesomely made body-horror effects.

   The Thing opens with a really cool flying saucer rocketing towards the Earth, and it crashes in the Antarctic. After the opening titles, a beautiful dog is being chased by a Norwegian helicopter and fired at with a rifle. After the copter lands and the pursuing Norwegians accidentally destroy their helicopter, and the survivor continues to fire at the dog as he flees to an American research base, where he is killed by the station commander.

The UFO zooms through space towards Earth a hundred thousand years ago.

   The Americans search the Norwegian camp, but only find charred corpses, and then they discovered a horrifically disfigured corpse with two faces. Autopsy reveals it to be human, meanwhile the dog is brought into a kennel with other dogs. The dog is revealed to be The Thing in disguise when it makes a grisly transformation, its face splitting open and its body bursting, with long red tentacles flailing about, trying to attack and assimilate the other dogs. After they burn the creature, another autopsy is taken, and it is revealed that the dog is afflicted with an alien parasite that perfectly imitates its host. Meanwhile, the records that the Norwegians left behind leads them to the crashed saucer, buried in the ice and snow, where it is theorized to have lain for 100,000 years. The camp realizes the danger of the Thing and decide to use safety precautions to prevent further infection.

The assimilated dog.

   As the movie goes on, the Thing slowly starts to assimilate other people, and each time it is revealed with more horrifyingly bloody effects, and we see each of the research team members break down mentally. No one trusts anyone else, no one seems to know who's really human, and who's the Thing. They turn on one another when a blood test to see who's human and who isn't is sabotaged, as panic and paranoia takes hold on all of them. 

A victim of The Thing mid-transformation!

   Finally, they have a new way to test and see who's human and who isn't. One of the team members believes that each small part of The Thing acts on its own, and has its own will to survive. They test this by taking samples of everyone's blood, and exposing it to a hot wire. When one of the blood samples jumps in the air and tries to get away from the copper wire, the Thing is revealed and transforms, attempting to assimilate more people. The grand finale occurs when the people left over destroy the base, hoping to destroy the alien as well. Those who survived simply wait to freeze in the Antarctic night, hoping that whatever is left of the alien being freezes as well. 

The Thing as seen in the film's blood-filled  fiery finale!

   The Thing was really enjoyable for two reasons: The interactions the characters have due to their paranoia, and the over-the-top nasty special effects that still hold up to this day. While to some this may seem like nothing more than a mindless gorefest, and if that's what you enjoy about it is the over-the-top gore, great! That IS one of the big things about this movie. But the characterization and the interactions between everyone in the film, the drama and the fear and the overwhelming paranoia that they succumb to, that also is a big part of this movie, and that's what makes it great! I'd definitely recommend this sci-fi horror to anyone who loves gore and body-horror. Otherwise, stay away from this film, as you won't enjoy it if you find such things off-putting. A must-see for horror fans!