Customer Reviews

The Thing (BFI Modern Classics)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Ms.Billson's book is an invaluable resource to anyone who has recognized the true genius of Mr.Carpenter's movie. I have been haunted by the themes and images of this film ever since I first saw it over 15 years ago. The greatness of this true horror classic is wonderfully defended by Ms.Billson with a style that not only makes for easy reading but allows the film's fans to once again relive the heart pounding brilliance of Mr.Carpenter's masterpiece.

As a devoted fan of John Carpenter's The THING, I was thrilled to come across Anne Billson's definitive tome about Carpenter's greatest film. Here Ms. Billson eloquently defends what she deems a horror classic. Describing the film scene by scene and injecting a lot of personal theory, Anne Billson has lovingly penned a tribute to the best monster movie of the last 30 years. A must for any fan of John Carpenter and horror films. Only Paul M. Sammon's wonderful Future Noir comes close to equalling the excellence of Billson's book.

Bilson is obviously a fan of the film. This isn't one of the more in-depth or scholarly analyses in the BFI series, but it does make a good companion piece to the film (and to the 1952 "The Thing From Another World" film version of the short story - "Who Goes There?" - that Carpenter's 1982 film is based on).

In a nutshell, Bilson asserts that the film critics who panned the film upon its initial release completely missed the boat and the point. This film was original in so many underappreciated ways, and it remains to this day a standard-bearer.

The author explores the idea that the titular Thing may as well be, for all intents and purpose, female. That, and that Carpenter and screenwriter Bill Lancaster were both very brave and correct to dodge conventional Hollywood wisdom by casting the film with all-male and mostly lesser-known actors, and that the timing of the making of the film thankfully preceeded the political-correctness period that now practically mandates a Rainbow Coalition of skin colors. Clearly, Carpenter was focused solely on the story, and kept all other interferences at bay.

One of my favorite assertions that Bilson makes, and I am certainly in agreement with her, is that if the AFI list of Greatest Film Quotes of All Time allowed for profanity, "The Thing" would be well-represented!

This isn't the most thought-provoking BFI entry, but it is affectionately written, for sure, without being kissy-kissy.

I still love this book series, however. I always ask for a BFI book for my birthday. Next BFI books up for me: "The Shawshank Redemption", "Crash", and "The Thin Red Line".

Stay tuned.

The BFI sometimes pick the wrong writer to cover certain films for their Film Classic series. Anne Billson is one of the better writers. She doesn't confuse the reader and covers the film from start to finish. The only draw back is that it does sometimes seem that she is just recounting the story, using her own words to add tension, but she does make up with some interesting commentary.

This film really captures the horror of the story Who Goes There by John W. Campbell Jr. He was the editor of Astounding Science Fiction in the 40s when I was in High schol and I read him and the other great authors largely unknown to present day fans. The first attempt to put the story on celluloid called The Thing was a hugh disappointment to us Sci Fi buffs as it had little to do with the plot other than the location on the polar cap. I was relieved to see that the remake captured the overwhelming ominous dread of the printed word that was new to us in our teens. This same alien horror was again used in Invasion of the Body Snatchers, now going into it's third remake I am told. Heaven help us!