In four short years, John Carpenter followed his wholeheartedly fearsome Shatner-masked mutation with the unseen terror of homichlophobia before confronting the ultimate in evil: a heedless remake of one of horror cinema’s Pantheonic achievements, The Thing From Another World. Filmmakers Christian Nyby and Howard Hawks went out of their way to conceal the identity of their “human carrot” until the end. Carpenter’s biggest fault lies in his desire to jam down our throats a creature enlivened by special effects, one that doesn't necessitate a costumed human or, better yet, the activation of an audience’s imagination. It’s difficult to feel much fear when the monster in question is laughably composed of what appears to be a Venus flytrap regurgitating a killer shrew. The cast, all of whom succumb to death by billing, is first rate as is cinematographer Dean Cundey’s night work. And on a positive note, it was Ennio Morricone, not the director, who composed the score. Carpenter knows how to turn up the atmospherics and ‘Scope composition don’t come much cleaner, but this R rated microcosm of paranoiacs is better suited to PG-13-year-olds. To celebrate the film’s 40 year anniversary, Fathom Events is reissuing the film to theatres on June 19 and 22. (1982) — Scott Marks
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