The Thing

The prequel to John Carpenter's "The Thing", from 1982, turns out to be a good complement to the franchise and to the whole "Alien" inspired movies genre. It is unfortunate that it has not acquired the required attention for producing a whole future trilogy, which is, I can tell,  the dream of some followers.

Straight to the point, the story begins when a group of explorers discovers a space craft buried under the Antarctic ice, accompanied by a frozen specimen. This is more than enough to have a group of American scientists join the Norwegian team to decipher this new discovery.

For those who saw the first film, they will be glad to have more information about the origins of the Thing, but without the transcendental features. Maintaining the same level of mistrust, human emotions and the maneuvers of survival, it is not entirely terrible as some of us already know how this alien thing works; but the degree of distortion is compensated with the metamorphosis images.

On the other hand, there is a proper character development and the suspense grows into intensity. Therefore, it is easy to detect its structure based on "Alien", even making us somehow compare the star  with Ellen Ripley.

The suspense is great because of the difficulty in distinguishing the infected from the healthy ones. Like the predecessor, we never know when and how this transmission occurs. This contributes to the stress growing on screen, but one remains thoughtful about it.

There is no doubt that, visually, it is quiet impressive to see graphic scenes such as mutilations, horrific situations, suffering, deformation, blood, death and burned beings. Overall, it is a classic script that achieves its goal of connecting a previous event with its following one, including the ending and opening sequence used as a  tool to invite the audience to watch the horror classic starring Kurt Russell.

Fact is that the effectiveness of horror movies depends greatly on the actors' performances. Mary Elizabeth Winstead shows potential as an action heroine: she is confident and makes it easy for us to symphatize and put ourselves into her shoes. AAnd we really want to survive next to Joel Edgerton, who is colder and sharper than the rest of the cast. The rest of the cast fits well with horror, mystery and genuine expressions. There is really no one you can trust.

The director Matthijs Van Heijningen Jr. demonstrates full knowledge of the first film because the scenarios and scenes end up being extremely familiar with the sequel. He also has a good sense of coordinating the scenes of horror so as to give them big impact, also thanks to realistic effects. He innovated the concept but remained faithful to the original context, did not seek to outdo the original, but just to polish it. Today, this genre has fallen so much that we appreciate his dedication to the traditional science and horror fiction.

In general, for being a prequel, it was quite entertaining. It is noteworthy that video editing is stable while the sound exceeds certain limits. The music is tensed, but the final tone is classic for making us remember. The cinematography might be simple but essential.

It is not better than the first but it is an endorsement and a tribute to one of the greatest horror movies.

Director: Matthijs van Heijningen Jr.

Writers: Eric Heisserer, John W. Campbell Jr.

Stars: Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Joel Edgerton and Ulrich Thomsen