'The Thing' Invades Universal - Remake will draw from previous ...

In some ways Carpenter's version was actually closer to the book "Who Goes There" on which the 1951 film was supposedly based. Still the original movie is one of my favorite Sci Fi films of all time. Fingers crossed that Moore does the remake justice, unlike recent trashing of The Day the Earth Stood Still.

No denying Moore is an excellent screen writer, but can't Hollywood do anything original? There are a lot of great science fiction stories out there that would make great films.

Jimmy wrote:

No denying Moore is an excellent screen writer, but can't Hollywood do anything original? There are a lot of great science fiction stories out there that would make great films.

I actually deny that. Moore is a terrible writer and producer.

This is the worst idea that I've heard since the last idea of doing a remake written by a bad writer, wihch was a couple days ago.

Hollywood is stuck in a rut of constantly doing ever-worse remakes of films written by their bad (but highly hyped-up) writers.:(

Carpenter's film showed you could do a great remake. But he was at the time a great filmmaker. Moore is a terrible writer-producer who excels at hype, not filmmaking.

In the original version James Arness played the Thing. He was also credited as being the tallest actor (6 Ft 7") to have a male lead part. Arness went on to fame as Matt Dillon, on Gunsmoke.

At best, they will blow our minds with high-tech graphics, bells and whistles, I doubt if the story changes much, they will probably take outlandish liberties with the film, take out things, change things, or add things that won't make much sense to the people who are familiar with the original story!!

RagsTTiger wrote:

In the original version James Arness played the Thing. He was also credited as being the tallest actor (6 Ft 7") to have a male lead part. Arness went on to fame as Matt Dillon, on Gunsmoke.

Always a kick to see someone who was a glorified extra go on and become one of the biggest TV stars of all time.:)(

Actually, there wasn't much to the original story to begin with (nor is there in most really good horror/sci-fi plots). Cronenberg's treatment was gooier and utilized other elements of horror to make what was essentially a two paragraph short story into a highly-effective movie. Writers of horror movies these days wouldn't understand subtlety if it came up out of the john and burrowed into their large intestines (which makes wonder when the inevitable remake of CHUDs--that's Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers, for those of you not familiar with horror schlock movies of the 1980s--or Ghoulies is going to be).

Thorny wrote:

Actually, there wasn't much to the original story to begin with (nor is there in most really good horror/sci-fi plots). Cronenberg's treatment was gooier and utilized other elements of horror to make what was essentially a two paragraph short story into a highly-effective movie. Writers of horror movies these days wouldn't understand subtlety if it came up out of the john and burrowed into their large intestines (which makes wonder when the inevitable remake of CHUDs--that's Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers, for those of you not familiar with horror schlock movies of the 1980s--or Ghoulies is going to be).

Don't give them ideas!!! ;)

Quoting: << John Carpenter's 1982 version, simply called "The Thing," twisted the story into a classic parable of Cold War paranoia... >>
Response: Hmmm??? I would say it contains very little twisting of the story, very little "Cold War paranoia," and I wouldn't call it a "parable," classic or otherwise. It's just a good horror movie.

Dean - NYC wrote:

Quoting: << John Carpenter's 1982 version, simply called "The Thing," twisted the story into a classic parable of Cold War paranoia... >>
Response: Hmmm??? I would say it contains very little twisting of the story, very little "Cold War paranoia," and I wouldn't call it a "parable," classic or otherwise. It's just a good horror movie.

The original story was a parable of Cold War paranoia and the original movie also to a degree.

Of course with Ron Moore in charge it's not even worth thinking about it.:(

All good horror movies have some subtext that may not be evident to the casual viewer. This is not to say that you have to be a Rhodes Scholar to enjoy The Thing, for instance, but it does give movies like it a little more meat (so to speak) than complete dreck like Hostel or the Saw series. On that, the Saw quintology (if that's even a word) attempts to be subtextual by positing the question: "What would do to save yourself or somebody you truly love?" In the end, though, it's just an excuse for horrible dialogue, excessive gore and a bad taste in your mouth after the movie is over.

Both The Thing and the upcoming remake of V will probably not have subtext, and so will likely be nowhere near as good as their predecessors. Unfortunately, most filmmakers and writers these days are not schooled in the traditional/classical parts of their craft, and so they tend to put out schlock with little meaning. Frankenstein (the full-length original version, not the chopped-up edited versions first seen in theaters 60-plus years ago) is still a horrific movie because of the subtext; Friday the 13th (all of them, really) is just moronic.

Thorny wrote:

All good horror movies have some subtext that may not be evident to the casual viewer. This is not to say that you have to be a Rhodes Scholar to enjoy The Thing, for instance, but it does give movies like it a little more meat (so to speak) than complete dreck like Hostel or the Saw series. On that, the Saw quintology (if that's even a word) attempts to be subtextual by positing the question: "What would do to save yourself or somebody you truly love?" In the end, though, it's just an excuse for horrible dialogue, excessive gore and a bad taste in your mouth after the movie is over.
Both The Thing and the upcoming remake of V will probably not have subtext, and so will likely be nowhere near as good as their predecessors. Unfortunately, most filmmakers and writers these days are not schooled in the traditional/classical parts of their craft, and so they tend to put out schlock with little meaning. Frankenstein (the full-length original version, not the chopped-up edited versions first seen in theaters 60-plus years ago) is still a horrific movie because of the subtext; Friday the 13th (all of them, really) is just moronic.

With Ron Moore writing it, The Thing will probably not have subtext, but what I'll call "over-text", meaning pseudo-deep references, glaringly obvious so journalists can be sure to "get it" and tell the hoy-poloy what how great Rom Moore is.

So, I guess Rena won't be seeing it but the rest of us will give it a chance.

johnd wrote:

So, I guess Rena won't be seeing it but the rest of us will give it a chance.

I can't help but wonder how many bad remakes it'll take until people don't give them 'a chance".

It's Ron Moore. We all know it's going to be bad. ;)