The Thing (2003, DVD)

A 'B' film from the noted RKO studio, The Thing From Another World was a surprise blockbuster hit despite an obscure cast. The plot combined science-fiction, adventure, and horror with a talky but intelligent script and generally credible characters. The film holds up well today, and has been an obvious influence on later films, most notably Alien (1979).

The consensus is that Howard Hawks, who produced the film, eventually became the director as well. Christian Nyby received the screen credit, but it was his first film assignment as a director. Nyby had been Hawks' editor on several of his more famous films, including Red River (1948) for which he had received an Academy Award nomination.

Red River was not only the best film in the career of Hawks, but has the highest grade of any film I have seen, at 99.5/100. Red River was remade as a television movie in 1988, starring James Arness in the John Wayne role. Arness, best known as the brawny do-gooder sheriff in the long-running television western "Gunsmoke", has one of his earliest acting roles in The Thing. He plays the title character, which resembles a Frankenstein's monster with a really bad temper.

Another legend associated with The Thing is that Ben Hecht worked on the screenplay uncredited. Hecht, a frequent Hawks collaborator, was one the most successful screenwriters from the first half of the century.

A good indication that The Thing is a Hawks film is provided by Margaret Sheridan's character. Sheridan somehow received top billing, despite making her film debut and having a clearly smaller role than Ken Tobey. Sheridan's confident and elated performance is remarkably similar to that of an unrelated Sheridan, Anne Sheridan, in the then-recent Hawks film I Was a Male War Bride (1949).

One of the easiest criticisms to make of The Thing is its inevitable love interest subplot. Pairing up the highest ranking officer with the most attractive female is a predictable combination. Hawks does manage to spice up the romance with dialogue that refers to bondage, and then an actual (if tame) bondage scene. Of course, these scenes were promptly censored, and only in recent years restored to existing prints.

Sci-fi writer Isaac Asimov reportedly hated The Thing because it confirmed the stereotype of scientists as effeminate, condescending, and eccentric. Meanwhile, the Air Force personnel, while not particularly clever, are heroic, swell guys with a crackling sense of humor.

Dimitri Tiomkin's score was based on a theremin, an electronic contraption that emitted eerie tones whose frequency could be readily manipulated. While the theremin became associated with 1950s science-fiction movies, the device was first used for a pair of 1945 dramas, Billy Wilder's The Lost Weekend and Alfred Hitchcock's Spellbound.

The Thing was remade by John Carpenter in 1982, in a decidedly more gory fashion. Carpenter's version was more faithful to the original John Campbell Jr. novella "Who Goes There?", in which the alien could change its form at well. Hawks' low budget apparently precluded such a storyline, all the better to shift the story's focus to where it belonged, on the besieged and isolated Arctic human colony.

As with most science-fiction films, it is all too easy to find the holes in the incredulous story. Since there are possible spoilers that follow, feel free to stop reading at this time if you still cling to the erroneous belief that a film is ruined if you know what is going to happen next.

If the Thing is so intelligent, why would he land his spacecraft near the North Pole? If the spacecraft gives off heavy radiation, why don't the servicemen wear radiation suits while excavating it, or at least show some worry about its effects? Why would the ship completely disintegrate when heated, when it survived intact the descent through the Earth's atmosphere?

How did the servicemen manage to excavate the Thing, which must have weighed a ton when encased in ice? If they wanted to keep it from melting, why not simply leave it outside, rather than bring it inside and then break a window? Who would be stupid enough to put a heated electric blanket on a cake of ice, especially with the Thing encased in it?

If the Thing can cut through steel walls, why does it always come in through the door, where a booby trap obviously awaits it? Once the Thing cuts off the heat, why not wait until the servicemen freeze to death, instead of risking harm by attacking earlier?

It can be argued that these inconsistencies do not severely harm the movie, especially if the story does not dwell upon them. Since The Thing is an enjoyable, entertaining, and suspenseful film, perhaps the foibles of the characters only adds to the fun. (65/100)