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Rottenwatch: THE THING (Dir. A Crazy Swede, Mary Elizabeth Winstead)

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Just came back. I really enjoyed it.
Actually surprised there wasn't a proper cheesy moment in this, just a cool watch from beginning to end. The credits finale was perfectly executed.

I watched this at the Norwegian premiere and the crowd was great. All seven Norwegian actors there as well and they seemed to be enjoying themselves.

Being placed in the moment with todays cinema event I still feel like I'm a fairly reasonable and objective enough person but I can't understand the Rotten score for this.

Go watch.
 
Saw this yesterday. Really fun watch.
I did think they showed the alien too much. I didn't care much for the ship interior scenes. Overall though, I came away satisfied considering what it was. Oh and I loved how they ended it seamlessly with the '82 version

MEW was a weird choice, but she's purty....

Also I was at Universal Studios in Orlando this weekend and went to their Halloween Horror Nights and they had a haunted house based on the movie. Most of the stuff in the house was pulled from the movie, it was pretty cool. Even the recreation room was spot on.
 
Loved the joke at the beginning of the film.

Little boy walks in on his parents and sees his father giving it to his wife.
Boy runs out. Father says he will talk with the boy and sort it out.

He looks for the boy but to the fathers surprise he finds the boy pumping away at his grand mother with vigor. Boy looks up: Not fun when it's your own mom now is it?

Lololol.
 
Saw this last night with my wife. She was pretty freaked out, and I thought it was well done. Some pretty fun scares, and a decent sense of dread. The connections to the 1982 version and the ending were highlights. I can see why reviewers sometimes called it a remake - thematically and even scene-by-scene there SO many similarities to the 1982 Thing even though this is supposed to be a prequel. Ironic that according to this film basically the same thing happens at two different bases a few days apart.

Edit: Shit, the studio butchered this film. (Re: the link above) Feel sorry for the writer and director.

http://www.bloody-disgusting.com/news/26758
 
Was going to catch it in the next few days, but its already gone from the local theatre, lolz. Guess I'll see The Rum Diary instead.
 
The detail in the interview about the guy who dropped the grenade in the 82 version is brilliant. I hope they do a Director's Cut with all that stuff in.
 
Truant said:
The detail in the interview about the guy who dropped the grenade in the 82 version is brilliant. I hope they do a Director's Cut with all that stuff in.
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yeah that was very well thought out....and aggain the studio butcher the original script, a la fox and alien 3...
 
I feel pleased to read that actually most of the people from neogaf who watched the movie enjoyed it. Can't wait to see it myself.
 
Insane Metal said:
I feel pleased to read that actually most of the people from neogaf who watched the movie enjoyed it. Can't wait to see it myself.
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Its worth it in the theater IMO. As for the dead space comments, makes me lust for a proper movie for DS.
 
I've finally seen it.

I enjoyed it quite a lot. As others said, the CGI is simply horrible at times, what makes it a lot less fun. But overall it was a good movie. And I really like the links with Carpenter's version, like
the axe on the door, the dude in the radio, the skeleton outside, the hole at the ship site, and, of course, the dog.

I absolutely agree with Expendable's C rating. It could've been much better, but it is worth watching.
 
Just watched this with my girlfriend. Liked the atmosphere in the beginning, not so much in the latter half, hated the goofy CGI effects. All in all, it was ok. Although, I found it weird that they f**ked up the continuum with Carpenter's movie;
there should have been one or two norsemen left
.
 
As someone who loved the '82 one, this just wasn't as good, and everyone has already explained why. Too much CG, and the pacing went too far in the typical monster movie direction. Also, it's no surprise that the best part was probably the credits scene with the Morricone theme setting up the beginning of the '82 film. The score in this one was really lacking. That atmosphere just wasn't there because of it.

Still, it was better than I thought, and they managed to avoid typical tacked on love interests that nobody ever cares about when watching these things so points for that.

EDIT: Wow, just read that interview and the studio messed with what could've been a really good movie. The detail of the clumsy Norwegian guy is totally lost now and the original pacing and ending sound so much better.
 
Just saw this and honestly liked it a lot more than I expected. Was it perfect? No. But it certainly wasn't awful and really stood out in a lot of ways. I really wish this movie got a little more attention, it deserved it.

Im assuming, financially, it did poorly?
 
Saw this today, it was absolutely shameful.

There wasn't an ounce of tension, it never even approached being scary, the characters were as flat as could be, the effects were AW-FUL, and it was basically mediocre and lazy in every way.

It's hard to imagine that anyone who worked on this was ever a fan of the original.

edit: Looking a few posts up confirms my suspicions. Definitely felt like a film some studio execs fucked with.
 
Scullibundo said:
Oh fuck, I completely forgot to mention, but did anybody else notice what I'm 90% sure was a borrowed Icarus 1 distress beacon being used at the beginning of the film when they're tracking The Thing's ship?
Click to expand...

Hell yeah I did. It kinda took three or four times for it to go off but then I knew where I knew it from. It sounds really alike.
As a big fan of the original I loved the way the revealed the name of the movie it was an homage to the burning title of the original.

As many I was afraid of this movie because I knew it would be boosted by CGI effects, its a shame they dropped their scenes with the animatronics (which looked really really nice!).
I thought it was a nice movie (especially considering the fact that this is the directors first hollywood movie) but which threaded the same ways the 82 version did.
 
Demoncarnotaur said:
Has anyone seen this?

The Thing 2011/ ADI Creatures (Behind the scenes footage)


Spoilers^


Seems almost all of the effects in the movie were done practical and then replaced with cgi. Shame, because that stuff looks really, really good. Im looking forward to the blu-ray of this film..maybe it will explain what happened.
Click to expand...

I knew they did practical effects... but I heard they were unhappy with the onscreen results.

But watching that footage... holy hell, how could they have been unhappy with that?
 
Nappuccino said:
I knew they did practical effects... but I heard they were unhappy with the onscreen results.

But watching that footage... holy hell, how could they have been unhappy with that?
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I can't imagine them matching the speed and fluidity of the CG creatures with practical effects, the latter issue being the most severe I'd imagine. There should have definitely been a mixture of both CG and practical effects though.
 
harSon said:
I can't imagine them matching the speed and fluidity of the CG creatures with practical effects, the latter issue being the most severe I'd imagine. There should have definitely been a mixture of both CG and practical effects though.
Click to expand...

None the less, speed or not, they really should have used these and filmed accordingly, only using CG when needed. A mix really is a the best way to go, and its a shame they didn't use these more as they really do look freaking terrifying, and real. I cant understand why we didn't see more practical effects when it looked this good from behind the scenes footage.

Are there any interviews where they talk about why they went with CG instead of the practical effects?
 
Demoncarnotaur said:
None the less, speed or not, they really should have used these and filmed accordingly, only using CG when needed. A mix really is a the best way to go, and its a shame they didn't use these more as they really do look freaking terrifying, and real. I cant understand why we didn't see more practical effects when it looked this good from behind the scenes footage.

Are there any interviews where they talk about why they went with CG instead of the practical effects?
Click to expand...

i dont have the link but the studio took the film away from the director, changed the practical stuff into cg and cut a lot of the stuff about the norwegians.
 
S1kkZ said:
i dont have the link but the studio took the film away from the director, changed the practical stuff into cg and cut a lot of the stuff about the norwegians.
Click to expand...

Wait, so that means there should be a directors cut with practical effects floating around?
 
S1kkZ said:
i dont have the link but the studio took the film away from the director, changed the practical stuff into cg and cut a lot of the stuff about the norwegians.
Click to expand...

Are you serious? Thats such bull.

Too be honest, I enjoyed the film, but my god if they hadn't done this the movie would have been leagues better. =/
 
Interview with Eric Heisserer, the film's screenwriter, which discusses the use of computer generated imagery, the film's original pacing, and origins of the production.

On the replacement of practical effects with CGI.
"I got this job going in with the firm, fervid belief that no CGI should ever be in this movie. That it should be all practical. We are creating a very grounded psychological thriller and part of that paranoia with the monster movie is to have the monsters as real and as grounded as everything else we're making around them. That's not to say that I am slighting the CG department, because those guys are workhorses... [But] the last thing you want to do is take the audience out of the film. You want to have them married to the story. And I felt that, what little I saw being onset and in the dailies, the practical stuff looked great. But that's an argument that I was out of and it's an argument that I trust [director] Mattjis [van Heijningen Jr.] stuck with for as long as he could and for his reasons. While I'm not quite as qualified to talk about the specifics, I know that as a storyteller, we were all onboard with this being a practical movie."
Click to expand...

Reshoots and more CGI talk.
"As I understand it, they were replacing scene work outside of Antarctica. Like at Columbia where we meet Kate and to a lesser extent where we meet the other American members. The other re-shoots as I know them were more of a fight between practical effects and CG. When I was on set and when Mattjis shot a lot of this, and he's a great director by the way, it was all practical. We had Mary using a flamethrower on an animatronic and it looked great. It's hard to say what it looked like once they got into editing, I wasn't a part of that process, but I do know that there were two definite sides of the argument. There were people saying we had to replace with CG and there were people saying we could make the practical [effects] better in places where they fell short."
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Lack of character introductions.
"In terms of it being a slow boil, another victim of the test screening process was the character introductions. I think again it's a case of either for better or for worse. Either audiences are going to really get into the movie, or they'll feel that something is missing. Coming from the standpoint where I know everything that is missing, it's hard for me not to go, ‘wait a minute!' Scott Frank and I both talked about 'Jaws' as a benchmark when it comes to character introductions. Scott did a quick pass on the script at one point and wrote some fantastic material for when you first meet Carter, Griggs, Jameson, and of course, Kate. The Norwegian pilot doesn't arrive to pick them up at McMurdo, so Kate and Sander ask Carter for a ride. That's Carter's original introduction -- when he faces off against Kate's boss. So when we lose [those] moment, we lose good character building stuff that glues the scenes together. Right now we get to the monster as fast as possible and, since the test screenings proved that's what those audiences wanted. I can't say yay or nay to it. But it does feel like there are pieces of it missing."
Click to expand...


On test screenings.
"Test screenings really changed the shape of this film from what I wrote to what the audience will ultimately see, for better or worse... I can say that going through this experience that no studio would make a film like 'Alien' or even Carpenter and Lancaster's version of 'The Thing' today. There is a sense of impatience from the audience to just get to whatever it is they paid their ticket for. And that can hurt filmmakers but it can also help box office. It's a strange argument to have."
Click to expand...

More talk of the lack of character on the Norwegian parts.
"The work we put into the Norwegians also got marginalized for the sake of running time. They just wanted to make the movie leaner and meaner. One of the things that wound up on the cutting room floor is a real sense of individualism among the Norwegians... In doing so, I think we lost some really fun continuity moments between this film and the Carpenter/Lancaster one. For instance, one of the Norwegians, Lars had a number of moments where he was just a klutz. He was a butterfingers. He dropped things. And it gave you the sense that this guy is going to be "Thinged" right away. He's a red shirt, he's not gonna last. And the surprise is that he makes it all the way to the end. He's one of the two guys who makes it all the way to the helicopter. And when you watch Carpenter's version you realize he's the one who drops the grenade and blows himself up, because he's the klutz. I don't think much of that managed to make it to the end..."
Click to expand...


Source: http://www.bloody-disgusting.com/news/26758
 
So I'm about six minutes in. I'm loving how they are referencing the original with the old Universal logo, the dog, "Who Can It Be Now?".

Very cute.
 
Just watched this. I really liked it even if it loses itself in the final act. But it seems the studio meddled with that
spacehip
sequence near the end the most. The CG was pretty good too. Some of it looked great, some of it looked mediocre. From watching the special features it was pretty clear it was always meant to be an even mix of practical and CG though. They wanted to do extensions on the big animatronic Things, things like tentacles and limbs. I guess they went a bit further than that. The director said that a lot of the
spacehip
scene at the end was altered. What a shame a lot of the scene felt thrown together and it had some of the worst effects in the movie.

This will definitely be a yearly rewatch for me, though, along with Carpenter's film. I liked how it fit in with his film. They went in a lot of ways I didn't expect.
 
The movie was always going to have CG in it, they just wanted to use mostly practical with CG mixed in. Most likely the mixing of the two didn't turn out looking that great and they just decided to go full CG instead. Mixing the two is usually the best, but it also requires good talent to make it work right. Could just have been an issue with the quality of the FX folks and the budget that forced them to go full CG

NotTheGuyYouKill said:
I.....

would love a sequel. Somehow. Like, a good one.
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Sequel came out years ago
 
One thing I learned from the special features was how far stunts with fire have come. They lit up a bunch of stuntmen and stuntwomen for a long time in this movie and the new gels really keep the actors relatively cooled down.
 
Finally saw this and it was...very mediocre. It copied some stuff from the original, which paled in comparison, and the new stuff was not that interesting. It had its moments though.

A few comments:

The things in this film are so much more powerful than the ones in the original, why do they even bother hiding in bodies? For the most part the thing was weak when exposed in the original but in this one it's crazy powerful.

What happened to the main character woman (don't even remember her name) at the end of the film? She kills the guy and then it just cuts to the credits/epilogue.

The original had interesting characters, while this one had a few Americans with personalities and then the nameless Norwegians.

I did like all the little details that connected it to the sequel, especially the epilogue during the credits.
 
Synth_floyd said:
The things in this film are so much more powerful than the ones in the original, why do they even bother hiding in bodies? For the most part the thing was weak when exposed in the original but in this one it's crazy powerful.

What happened to the main character woman (don't even remember her name) at the end of the film? She kills the guy and then it just cuts to the credits/epilogue.
Click to expand...

To your first point. The Thing never encountered humans and had to learn how to deal with them. Its approach in this film reflects its ignorance about the species behavioral patterns. It could be argued that it lost in this film because it is fleeing by the end. By the time of Carpenter's film it learned to assimilate better and tried a more sneaky approach. I've always assumed MacReady or Childs (probably Childs) was a Thing by the end of Carpenter's film and if a rescue team should come for them The Thing would make it to civilization and take over the world.

And your second point, the director wanted an ending like Carpenter's film, ambiguous but we can pretty much assume there is only death ahead and The Thing will eventually take over.
 
VistraNorrez said:
The Thing never encountered humans and had to learn how to deal with them. Its approach in this film reflects its ignorance about the species behavioral patterns.
Click to expand...
If imitating its victim didn't allow the thing to know pretty much all about their behavioral patterns right away, you'd just have to point the flamethrower at the mute guy foaming at the mouth... Didn't seem to be an issue.

By the time of Carpenter's film it learned to assimilate better and tried a more sneaky approach.
Click to expand...
I remember a fairly good example of "sneaky approach" in the prequel, actually (even if the thing then conveniently fucks it all up by just standing there for no good reason instead of seizing the opportunity).
 
I just watched and was pretty disappointed in this. I thought Winstead was good, and her character was well-written and believable. But the film had very little tension. I did fall for one jump-scare. The CG was overused, and seeing the footage of the practical effects makes me sad they couldn't have kept more of that. I thought the new test for the Thing was clever and they had some nice shout-outs and setups for Carpenters film. It just didn't have the atmosphere or pacing of the original, and suffers in comparison.
 
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