The Thing (1982) (Scream Factory Blu-Ray Review)

John Carpenter's 'The Thing' sadly didn't attain the status it has now for many years. Released a week after Steven Spielberg's 'ET', audiences and critics were turned off by a violent and angry alien attack movie and for many years until home video and now DVD/Blu-Ray the film did little to impress other than those few who saw the diamond in the rough. Now in 2016, Shout! Factory has provided the second Blu-Ray release with a new video/audio transfer and a load of special features, including some old favorites. So is this new release worth the double dip? I say yes, yes, a million times yes.

For those who don't know the tale, 'The Thing' has a group of researchers in Antarctica who discover a hostile alien life form who has the ability to assimilate the form of other humans in an effort to trick and protect itself from danger. This naturally leads to paranoia, violence, and terror in the snow ridden wilderness where there is no one to help and nowhere to hide. The film was released in 1982 but has a timeless feel to it. Other than some primitive technology or out of date clothing, the film's environment holds up due to its plainness and in this film's case, that's not a bad thing.

The cast is fantastic as well, with Kurt Russel in one of my favorite roles he's done for Carpenter. His 'give no shits' attitude suits him and from the opening scene with him and the computer chess, he hooks you in as a great character. The rest are good as well, though for many you do not get nearly as much time as you could in other films to develop them, you get a good sense of what they all provide for this facility and they provide humanity, humor, and sympathy throughout the run time. The special effects by Rob Bottin (The Howling) is still to this day the best in the business you could possibly provide. Nothing feels dated here, you believe that every gory, slimy creature on screen is truly alive and its a cliche to say at this point, but they really don't make them like this anymore if the 2011 prequel/remake is anything to go by you just can't recapture this film's awesome effects. Does the film have flaws? Yes it does, as most films usually have. The film is quite slow to take off, even for a John Carpenter film and modern audiences may feel cheated and bored before the titular 'Thing' even reveals itself. The film also suffers the opposite with a rushed ending in my opinion though to be fair, this may have been due to production troubles as shown in the special features. Still though, one wishes the film could have ended on a more satisfactory tone than what we ultimately get. 'The Thing' is still a great film after all these years and one of my top ten favorite Carpenter films.

The video quality has been remastered and differs greatly from the past Universal single disc release. The film looks brighter and crisper than the previous High Def picture and the contrast is enhanced slightly as well, giving us a better outline of blacks and colors. The film's darker moments seen in previous releases are now clear as day and the special effects in said shots stand out even more, bringing a big positive to this release. Overall, I love the picture here and it's far superior to the Universal release.

Audio on this release was subject to controversy leading to a delayed release but as far as I know, the issue has been resolved and the 4.1 and 5.1 channels both sound great. Though truth be told, I find little differences between the two, they are improvements from previous versions of the film. It's not going to blow you away or anything, this is a rather quiet film after all but the audio quality satisfies this reviewer.

Special Features include all previous features transferred over including Three Theatrical Trailers, TV Spots, Radio Spots, and Audio Commentary with John Carpenter and Kurt Russell. The good people at Shout! have given us a treasure trove of new material on a whole disc in itself with this collector's edition release including several new documentaries and featurettes while keeping the excellent 'Terror Takes Shape' from the previous DVD/Blu-Ray release. You also get a new Audio Commentary with Cinematographer Dean Cundey, The Network TV version of the film in its entirety, new interviews, and some archival documentaries from the time of the film's original release. This is a packed Blu-Ray collection folks and well worth the price alone. These are some amazing special features and once again Shout! has really outdone themselves this time.


While 'THE THING' is already an excellent film, this new release has given the film and its fans the treatment they deserve. From the upgraded quality to the vast amount of special features, this is a double dip well worth owning.


THE FILM:
 




 THE BLU-RAY:

Final Destination 2 (2003)

Death comes again in 'Final Destination 2' but you all know the plot, especially if you're clicking on a horror review site such as this. This time around, the premonition of young Kimberly (A.J. Cook) prevents a horrific pile up (and in my opinion the best opening accident of the franchise) and death now comes for those she saved. She must rely on these strangers as they try to protect each other and prevent more horrific fatalities. From here on out, I really can't criticize one sequel without doing them all in some aspects for they will now have a more specific formula than even the most basic slasher flick. Premonition, accident prevention, deaths come one by one, some kind of specific gimmick prevents certain characters from seeing the pearly gates. This series gets pretty basic, but I think that's the charm of them. Like Jason or Freddy, the 'Destination' films are entertaining and you know exactly what you're getting into and when it's over, you can go about your life. It's very much a rollercoaster or any other amusement park ride and these reasons are why I can't really hate on these films as much as a lot of other people seem to do.

They're really stupid, yes and death seems to have a lot of rules for being such a omnipotent being but damn that guy getting killed by a pane of glass shoots adrenaline into your brain and gets you going for more. And speaking of the death scenes, '2' may have the best of the bunch, or at least enough to have the majority in any top 10 list. A nice mix of practical and cgi effects make these stand out well, with my personal favorite being the flying barbed wire fence gag. If you read my review of the original movie, you may have noticed that I had some more philisophical or meaningful aspects to discuss, sadly this is not the case with 'Final Destination 2' nor any of the sequels that would follow. It's simply a cheap thrill, cash grab movie that's meant to have its time in the sun for the weekend, then quietly bow out and there's nothing wrong with that but for those who are looking for something more, you aren't finding it with this franchise sorry.

Even most 'Friday' or 'Nightmare' films have some good characters, or some aspect to them that keep them higher up, however here you really are just here to see people die and little else. I recommend it for fans of the first film, as I think it's the best sequel but everybody else can do better.

TRIVIA:

-Clear from the original film returns here and is first seen in an mental institution. The set used was the same from 2002's 'Halloween Resurrection'.

-The character Tim was 9 years old in the original script, however New Line feared backlash and aged him up to 15. Killing full grown adults are okay though...

-Devon Sawa, who portrayed Alex in the original film was set to return here, however disputes over his contract led to his absence and a really lame and insulting off-screen death (brick fell on his head.)

-One character has refrigerator magnets which spell out 'HEY E'. His death is predicted by these when the 'H' falls off and spells 'EYE'.

Final Destination (2000) REVIEW

Back in the late 90's the horror genre had gotten a slight revival with Wes Craven's 'Scream', however things were starting to become stale at a faster pace than before, with rip off after rip off spinning off the press. Jeffery Riddick and Glen Morgan, two screenwriters then wrote a concept script for the 'X-Files' TV show and 'Final Destination' would be born. Now here we are sixteen years later with four sequels with a possible reboot on the way but how does the original hold up? I think for those who may have seen the sequels first, it will likely disappoint. This film was more about the suspense and the eerie supernatural elements rather than the blood rushing over the top 'Mouse Trap' kill scenes that we would see in later entries.

For those who are unfamiliar with the series, a group of young teens escape an early death after witnessing a premonition of a horrific accident, in this film's case a plane crash. They believe themselves lucky, until death starts coming for them with a vengeance. The film had a unique style to it that even at the time separated it from other teen horror films of the time. It's dark atmosphere really keeps your attention. From the moment the film begins, you get a sense of looming horror at every turn, something many films now don't even attempt. Most films slowly ease you in, but 'Final Destination' lets you know right away something isn't right about this world and it's not going to let up anytime soon.

The cast is more believable here too, with Ali Larter standing out and even Sean William Scott does really well here when most would consider him just a goofball. While I said this film is much more toned down, that's not to say there isn't some horrific stuff here. I won't spoil any here, but I must say two specific ones stand out and even made John Denver music scary, a similar effect would come later with 'Insidious'. The film does have its flaws however, with most stemming from genre tropes and general mistakes. The franchise has a coroner character played by Tony Todd in every film, and while I really have no issue with Mr. Todd and he's definitely creepy, he serves no purpose other than a cameo/exposition dump on the characters and that's it. These scenes in all of the films really slow it to a crawl when they could have easily discovered the supernatural motives themselves.

I also think that for a film with a very clever and new idea for its time it reduces almost every character to a mere body count tally when we should feel more for them than we do. One scene deals with a father confronting the main character Alex when his son is taken by Death. This should have been a very deep emotional scene where we feel for the father and understand his blame, but since we didn't really get to know the deceased that well, we just brush it off like another slasher victim. The scene in the photo above as well suffers from this problem and while the scene is very over the top I still wished to have known this character a little better.

So overall, I say that I still enjoyed 'Final Destination' after all these years. It holds up well as a serious, dark thriller with a great story but I now can see the many holes through the rose colored glasses and know it's a flawed film. However, with some of the most generic, bland and recycled films in the genre since 2000, I'd say those flaws are easy to ignore so check it out if you have yet to do so, and check out the whole franchise if you liked it.