THE THING (1951) vs. THE THING (1982) - Cold War Classic to Cosmic Horror Masterpiece

THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD (1951) d. Christian Nyby (USA)
THE THING (1982) d. John Carpenter (USA)
THE THING (2011) d. Matthijs van Heijningen (USA)

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This week, we’re discussing Howard Hawks’ The Thing from Another World (1951) and John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982), two science-fiction horror films that, despite sharing a source in John W. Campbell Jr.’s novella Who Goes There?, reflect very different eras in filmmaking and cultural anxiety and both represent landmark moments in genre cinema.

MASTERS OF HORROR: SEASON 1 - LOOKING BACK AT 20 YEARS OF MOH!!

MASTERS OF HORROR (2005-2007) was a horror anthology series like none before, making its small-screen bow on the cable channel Showtime in October 2005.

Created by Mick Garris, the show brought together some of the most renowned names in horror filmmaking to direct hour-long episodes that showcased their unique visions. Predating the wave of multi-voiced anthology films like V/H/S and ABCs of Death, each episode was a self-contained story, with genre icons such as John Carpenter, Dario Argento, Tobe Hooper, Stuart Gordon, John Landis, Joe Dante, and Don Coscarelli, alongside newer voices such as Lucky McKee and Takashi Miike, exploring different themes and scenarios ranging from supernatural terror to the murderer next door.

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The idea behind the series emerged from informal dinners hosted by Garris, with established horror directors sharing ideas and mutual admiration for one another, as well as discussing the genre’s rich history and diversity.

VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED (1960): ENTER IF YOU DARE!!

VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED (1960) d. Wolf Rilla (UK)
CHILDREN OF THE DAMNED (1964) d. Anton Leader (UK)
VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED (1995) d. John Carpenter (USA)
THE MIDWICH CUCKOOS (2022) d. David Farr (UK)

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Get ready for a spine-chilling journey into Midwich, England, aka the VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED (1960) as we break down this brilliant sci-fi/horror classic’s eerie legacy. Based on John Wyndham’s 1957 source novel, The Midwich Cuckoos, and directed by stalwart Wolf Rilla who shared credit for the screenplay with Stirling Silliphant, future Oscar-winner for In the Heat of the Night (1967) and the TV series Route 66.

THREE RING KING SPRING FLING: CUJO, CHRISTINE, and THE DEAD ZONE at 40!!!

CUJO (1983) d. Lewis Teague (USA)
THE DEAD ZONE (1983) d. David Cronenberg (USA)
CHRISTINE (1983) d. John Carpenter (USA)

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Four decades ago, in the latter half of 1983, three films based on the works of a rising horror star hit theaters. Having already attracted such established veterans Stanley Kubrick and George A. Romero, as well as rising stars like Brian De Palma and Tobe Hooper, to helm the big-screen adaptations of his novels, STEPHEN KING was quickly becoming a pop culture icon, such that having his name attached to a project (almost) insured box office success.

THE RETURN(S) OF LAURIE STRODE: HALLOWEEN H20 VS. HALLOWEEN/KILLS/ENDS

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The Night HE Came Home… and SHE Came Back! (And then came back again!)

In 1998, after a downward spiral of increasingly inferior sequels, Jamie Lee Curtis returned to the role that made her a star with HALLOWEEN H20: TWENTY YEARS LATER. The backstory: Laurie Strode faked her death in order to escape her psychotic sibling, and is now living a fragile existence as an alcoholic, overly protective single mother and headmaster of a private California high school. (A move that pleased some fans and enraged others, since the events of the previous three installments are essentially ignored here.)

IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS (1995) Blu-ray Review

SCARE-A-THON Totals to Date:

Total Movies Watched: 11
Total First Time Views: 6
Amount raised for BOXVILLE: $735.02 

In the Mouth of Madness (1995) d. John Carpenter (USA) (95 min) (3rd viewing)

“Do you read Sutter Cane?”

Called in to investigate the disappearance of popular horror writer Sutter Cane (Jürgen Prochnow), insurance investigator John Trent (Sam Neill) attempts to determine whether or not the whole thing is a huge publicity stunt. Meanwhile, the release of Cane’s latest novel coincides with outbreaks of violence and maniacal behavior among the reading populace.

HALLOWEEN (2018) movie review

Halloween (2018) d. David Gordon Green (USA) (106 min)

Truth be told, I have never been a huge fan of the Halloween franchise. Like most horror fans (and cinephiles in general), I hold the original in high esteem both for its skillful execution on a minimal budget and its lasting effectiveness despite an endless stream of imitators, but I never really bought into the “Strode-Myers-Lloyd-Thorn Family Curse” storyline introduced in Halloween II and extrapolated over another three decades. The key to Halloween ’78 was its brilliant combination of the simple and the mythic, the commonplace and the unimaginable, with a spritz of supernatural flavoring its final moments.

ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK (1981) Blu-ray Review

Escape from New York (1981) d. John Carpenter (USA)

As the second of their two-picture deal with Avco-Embassy (following The Fog), producer Debra Hill and writer/director Carpenter set their eye on realizing a sci-fi/action script he had written in the mid-’70s, with the entire island of Manhattan having been turned into a maximum security prison with a 50-foot detainment wall built around its perimeter. Into this scenario Carpenter and co-screenwriter Nick Castle (who had played “The Shape” in 1978’s breakout Halloween) dropped ruthless and charismatic mercenary Snake Plissken (Kurt Russell) and a wild, do-or-die plot about rescuing the President of the United States (Donald Pleasence) after Air Force One is hijacked and crash-landed in the Big Apple. On a budget of $6 million (substantial, but still smallish for the project’s ambitious scale), the creative team – with special nods to production designer Joe Alves, cinematographer Dean Cundey, and one of the coolest ensemble casts EVER – emerged with a critical and box office hit . . . and an all-time iconic character in “Call me Snake” Plissken.

ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13 (1976) Blu-ray Review

Assault on Precinct 13 (1976) d. John Carpenter (USA)

Two elements hang heavy over any critical viewing of Carpenter’s second feature (and his first to be executed over a normal shooting schedule – his debut, Dark Star, was a college film shot in fits and starts that was later picked up for distribution, resulting in additional reshoots): 1) it is a conscious reworking of Howard Hawks’ 1959 classic western Rio Bravo with John Wayne, Dean Martin and Ricky Nelson, and 2) the onscreen shooting of a young girl (played by Disney fave Kim Richards) earned Assault on Precinct 13 instant notoriety. The latter item infuriated the MPAA and more sensitive reviewers, but being that this was an unabashed low-budget exploitation piece, it became the talking point that proved, “Any publicity is good publicity.” Following its initial cool reception in the U.S., the film became a critical and commercial success in Britain, affording the young writer/director (and composer and editor) the traction to mount what would become one of the most successful independent films in history, Halloween.

BODY BAGS (1993) DVD/Blu-ray Review

Body Bags (1993) d. John Carpenter / Tobe Hooper (USA)

I’ll be honest, until its recent DVD/BR unearthing by Shout! Factory’s Scream Factory division, I had nearly forgotten this made-for-cable anthology effort even existed, much less sought it out. Since it’s billed as “John Carpenter presents Body Bags,” I was even unaware that Carpenter had served as director for the majority of the piece (two segments and the wraparound). Blame it on Wes Craven, whose stream of similarly branded straight-to-video awfulness (Dracula 2000, They, the 1998 Carnival of Souls remake) left me more than a little gun shy. And, in addition to the fact that it was made for Showtime long before its original programming was the stuff of ACE awards, no one within my horror crew ever talked about it. Like, at all. Even when the conversation would turn toward Carpenter and his output, people seemed to go out of their way to ignore this little gem, skipping straight from 1988’s They Live to 1994’s In the Mouth of Madness (with completists throwing in a cursory nod to Memoirs of an Invisible Man from 1992) without so much as a good, bad, or otherwise. Which is a darn shame, because this is horror charm on the cheap, a slice of low-budget cheese that should delight any fan of Tales from the Crypt or the short-lived syndicated series, Monsters.

PRINCE OF DARKNESS (1987) Blu-ray Review

Prince of Darkness (1987) d. Carpenter, John (USA)

With a story centering on a 7-million-year old canister in the basement of a Los Angeles church, kept secret by the Catholics for millennia, this heady brew of quantum mechanics, Christianity, occult legend and science fiction transmissions from the future left critics and audiences puzzled and dissatisfied upon its release in 1987. Over the years, however, it has slowly gained traction among the horror faithful. While I’m still no card-carrying convert and I’ve yet to drink the “unsung classic” Kool-Aid, I’m more willing a couple decades later to give it the benefit of the doubt. Not sure if this says more about the movie or my ever-slipping quality standards, but where I used to find it poorly performed and irretrievably cheap and convoluted, I now find it slightly less offensive in all departments. Damnation by faint praise? Maybe, but it’s a decided step up from the vitriol I was doling out before.

IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS (1994) movie review

In the Mouth of Madness (1994) d. Carpenter, John (USA)

“Have you read Sutter Cane?” With echoes of Lovecraft’s mythology and blatant parallels to bestselling author Stephen King’s career, this represents one of Carpenter’s most intelligent and daring efforts. Called in to investigate the disappearance of popular horror writer Sutter Cane, insurance investigator Sam Neill attempts to determine whether or not the whole thing is a huge publicity stunt. Meanwhile, the release of Cane’s latest novel coincides with outbreaks of violence and maniacal behavior among the reading populace.

SOMEONE’S WATCHING ME! (1978) movie review

Someone's Watching Me! (1978) d. Carpenter, John (USA)

First shown a month after Halloween hit theatres and made available on DVD in 2007, John Carpenter’s TV-movie about a psychopathic peeping tom preying upon female high-rise victims shows the writer/director near the top of his game. Lauren Hutton plays a sexy, funny offbeat TV director who moves to Los Angeles with her new station job, and soon is receiving strange packages and phone calls from a mystery stalker who seems to know her every move.

October Horror Movie Challenge 10/10

IF I WERE A CARPENTER (AND YOUR NAME WAS JAMIE…)


Halloween (1978) (11th viewing) d. Carpenter, John (USA) 91min
From its shocking opening reveal to jaw-dropping climax, this low-budget masterpiece instantly announced itself as a modern day horror classic, shattering box-office records and inspiring the modern-day slasher genre. Nearly twenty years after Psycho terrified viewers out of their showers, director John Carpenter and producer Debra Hill co-wrote the brilliantly minimalist script of an escaped lunatic terrorizing the small Illinois township of Haddonfield. Trick-or-treating would never be the same. Donald Pleasance shines as frantic psychiatrist Sam Loomis, the only one who comprehends the extent of the evil that has been unleashed. Jamie Lee Curtis (in her film debut) provides the film’s emotional center as a bookish babysitter who, alongside fun-loving friends Nancy Loomis and P. J. Soles, unwittingly becomes the target of the masked boogeyman. Like Spielberg’s giant shark, Halloween’s unstoppable antagonist reaches near-mythic status, pursuing his prey with placid yet ferocious determination. Carpenter’s repetitive synthesizer and piano score heightens the tension, then shatters it with chilling efficiency time and again. In addition to inspiring a throng of “holiday-themed” horror offerings, the indie blockbuster spawned its own inevitable sequels (seven, plus Rob Zombie’s regrettable remakes), which contain nary a fraction of the original’s enduringly effective impact between them.