The THing Tagged Articles at Cinematical

I typically end up missing out on most kid films during their theatrical runs (there just isn't enough time to catch all the G-Forces of the world), but I recently caught up with the money-making monster that is Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs from the comfort of my own couch. Between watching baby dinosaurs swallow other baby Ice Age critters and thinking about winter's approach, my mind soon drifted towards some of my favorite ice-set moments in film.

I don't know what it is, but having nice, frozen centerpieces in a flick always lure me in. Though I do have my limits, as you won't be finding any of the brain pain that is 10,000 BC on here. Note, these are in no order of importance.

It's hard enough to make either a good sci-fi flick or a horror movie, one that avoids the tired stereotypes yet embraces the aesthetic, with a smart script that provides something fresh and new and solid direction that establishes a proper atmosphere and allows for surprising developments. And performances that don't camp it up but are sincere and convincing. Combining the two genres is much trickier than blending peanut butter and chocolate. That was my thinking when compiling this list. Your comments are more than welcome. What are your personal favorites? Here are mine:

1. Alien
I don't know if Ridley Scott actually realized he was making a sci-fi horror movie, so much as he thought he was making a stylish thriller. Call it willful ignorance, but that may have contributed to the refreshing absence of overcooked ideas, which typically pop up like dandelions for directors new to either genre. Like the original, original Star Wars (before George shined it up), Alien resides in a future which feels lived in and used up, from the battered old Nostromo to the planet that harbors the seeds of the crew's destruction. By keeping the alien (mostly) out of the shot, and showing instead what the creature has done, the level of terror keeps rising. A distinct sense of dread permeates the picture, and it still makes me shiver.

Read the rest over at SciFi Squad

The history of the movies is packed with tales of the 'little filmmakers that could'. Starting as far back as Ed Wood, right up to people like Robert Rodriguez, or The Blair Witch masterminds, there are tons of stories about filmmakers who defied the system and made movies on their own terms. After watching the short film, Manifest Destiny, I'm convinced that Darrell and Doug Waters could be the latest success story to add to the list. The sci-fi short is the first film by the Waters', and low-budget doesn't begin to describe it. Frankly, it doesn't get more cost-effective than shooting the whole thing in a garage using medical equipment you bought off eBay -- and may I just say, ewww.

The short film chronicles a supremely creepy alien autopsy and was inspired by 70's and 80's horror sci-fi like Invasion of The Body Snatchers and The Thing. The film manages to be scary and kind of sad at the same time, and I can only assume that these two guys will be using this short as a calling card for a feature deal. Considering it was made with props from eBay by two guys no one has ever heard of before, you'll have to admit, the results are pretty impressive.

So after years of wondering and months of alleged deals, it finally looks like Universal is dusting something off for a remake. SomeTHING I should say, so if you're a fan of Christian Nyby's The Thing (From Another World), John Carpenter's The Thing, or John Campbell's source material Who Goes There?, then you should be suitably elated to learn that Universal has tapped a writer and a director for the new-fangled version. Me, I'm fine with it. But if you come into my house and mess with my The Thing DVD, I may have to cut you. (More from Pete right here.)

Sam Raimi's long-awaited return to horror is called Drag Me to Hell, and while I won't get to see it for a few more weeks (sadface), the early buzz from the L.A. horror hounds is nothing but enthusiastic. I refuse to read ANYthing about this movie, but you can click around Bloody, Shock, and Dread to see what those gorehounds thought.

Oooh, next week we get a bunch of new Friday the 13th DVDs! (I wonder why.) Check out my little report on those platters right here. Directly opposite of next week we have last week, which is when we saw a few new horror flicks at Sundance. Those films were Grace (Snider's review / mine at FEARnet), The Killing Room (mine), and Dead Snow (Snider's / mine), and while it's not horror at all, Moon is just damn cool enough to warrant another mention. Here's James' review and here's mine. (It's old-school science fiction, in that it's about ideas AND technology. How very cool.)

Random bits on: Joss Whedon's Cabin in the Woods; that remake of The Crazies; the availability of the awesome [REC] on R1 DVD; and our multiple affectons for Sean Ellis' The Broken. (Ooh, the Martyrs DVD cover!)

"Wwwwwwwwait a Second! There's no NORWEGIANS in the CAMPBELL story!!" That's what I thought (and what Scott Weinberg put into words for me) when I clicked through Monika's mention of the planned new version of The Thing and read the article in Variety. Here's why: I hate it when filmmakers are (apparently) unfamiliar with the story they're basing their film on.

The sentence that made my eyes bug out? "New project borrows heavily from the John W. Campbell Jr. short story 'Who Goes There,' the basis of the [John] Carpenter film and 1951 Howard Hawks original The Thing From Another World. It is set in a Norwegian camp and chronicles how the shape-shifting alien was first discovered and overcame the inhabitants of that camp."

WRONG WRONG WRONG! I dug out my copy of the story, originally published in 1938, and read it again, just to make sure. There is no Norwegian camp in the story. It starts with the discovery of the alien -- referred to constantly as "the thing" -- in an Antarctic scientific camp, flashes back to reveal how it was discovered, and then follows the horror of what happens when the creature is thawed after 20 million years frozen in the ice.

The first version in 1951 sent a military unit to the Arctic base (flipping the world upside down), added a reporter plus a woman scientist to the mix as a love interest, and made the nightmarish creature from Campbell's story ("three red eyes, and that blue hair like crawling worms") into a humanoid played by James Arness (the future Marshall Dillon of TV's Gunsmoke). It was a fast-paced, black and white suspenser that worked quite well, thanks, no doubt, to producer Howard Hawks.

Who cares about the box office? Narnia sure doesn't! Prince Caspian might have struggled to put an impressive number of arses in seats, and gotten unceremoniously dumped by Disney, but someone still wants those Pevensie kids. The Hollywood Reporter posts that Fox 2000 is picking up the tossed aside The Voyage of the Dawn Treader and wants to get it in theaters by the holiday season in 2010. Talk about a risky proposition. The last one wasn't only over budget -- it brought in a sucky box office. Who in their right mind would take on a struggling series and try to bring dragons and other beasties to the big screen while saving pennies in a bad economy? The warning bells, they are a-ringing.

Meanwhile, The Thing is coming back to attack! But have no fear -- the man behind this might just make this a desirable remake. Variety reports that Ron Moore is writing a new treatment of the short story "Who Goes There," which was the basis for both Howard Hawks and John Carpenter's films. Who is Ron Moore? He's one of the executive producers of Battlestar Galactica, and has written most of the show's episodes. (He's at the top with 73, and the next closest are Bradley Thompson and David Weddle, each with 15.) Considering the fan mania and critical adoration involved with that show, if Moore can't make The Thing thrive in the 21st century, who can?

Finally, another girl is heading for a coma. Unfortunately, The Smiths won't be wishing her to pull through, and it's not based on Douglas Coupland's best book (yes, I said best). Even more unfortunately, The Hollywood Reporter posts that Girlfriend in a Coma is coming from Marco Schnabel and Larry Stuckey. Does that mean nothing to you? Schnabel directed The Love Guru, and Stuckey is the man who penned Little Fockers. Ugh. All that's being said about the plot is that it's a "satirical high school comedy that looks at an unlikely romance." Gee, could that be a girl in a coma? I think we've already covered that enough with Miss March.

Well, it's the day after Christmas -- Santa has packed up his sh*t and ditched town for another whole year -- and we're left with some stuff we want, some stuff we don't want and some stuff we haven't yet figured out. Like me, most of you will probably head on back to the mall today or over the weekend to do some returning, and with that extra cash in your pocket you might be looking for something film-related to pick up. Well, those new and old Blu-ray costumers should seriously run on over to Amazon.com, who have put roughly 200 titles on sale for 50% off.

There's no time like the present to stock your Blu-ray library, and if you haven't picked them up already, here are a few titles we definitely recommend WALL-E ($24.49), Bottle Rocket Criterion Collection ($23.99), The Thing ($16.49), The Shining ($13.99), A Clockwork Orange ($13.99) and The Nightmare Before Christmas. That should get you started ... now head on over to Amazon.com to check out the rest.

We here at Cinematical hope you're having a wonderful holiday season!

(As a way of welcoming my very favorite month of the year, I thought it would be fun to reprint one of the very few good articles I've ever written. So here it is!)

By: Scott Weinberg

House of Wax, starring Paris Hilton. The Fog, starring Wooden Superman. The Amityville Horror, starring Van Wilder.

Yep, it's tough to be an old-school hardcore horror fan these days, what with all the really atrocious remakes that keep flopping off of the studios' assembly lines. (If you paid money to see When a Stranger Calls, you're either one devoted horror fan -- or a really bored high school kid.) But since the Horror Fan is nothing if not loyally optimistic, we trudge off to each successive remake with a small kernel of hope -- maybe this one won't suck the proverbial egg. So while it's perfectly logical for a passionate horror geek to throw up his/her hands and shriek "Ack! Horror remakes! They all suck!!" -- the simple truth is that they don't all suck. The good ones are just pretty darn few and far between.

7. Night of the Living Dead (1990)-- Splatter-master Tom Savini got the chance to direct his own remake of Romero's all-time classic back in 1990, and -- whaddaya know? -- he did a pretty solid job of it! With extra gore dripping from the floorboards and the presence of genre favorites Tony Todd & Bill Moseley, this re-visit came long before the Remake Renaissance, but I think it still holds up pretty well today.

In a world where Don LaFontaine will no longer lend his voice to any trailers, and where floating heads and Photoshop skills are what passes for the 'art' in 'poster art', the prospect of Drew Struzan's retirement is almost too much to bear. The guys over at Ain't It Cool News got the initial news from TheRaider.net, and they get the fact that this makes the sun shine just that much less in this industry of ours.

In a message posted there, Struzan said: "Having been working at not working has produced a guy who could never return to illustration again. It took a lot to attempt the idea of retiring from my 40 years of effort and sacrifice but now that I have, I am delighting in life as never before. I had forgotten how to rest, to smell the proverbial roses and to see the future as opportunity. I am grateful and honored to have had the opportunity to do all the work I did. I am well pleased to have been able to give a gift of beauty and peace through my artwork to so many throughout the world. Now I have laid down the burden and have peace and happiness as the reward for my day's labor."

AICN aptly directs readers to Struzan's official site, and even if they hadn't, I'd advise the same course of action in an attempt to appreciate what iconic images he crafted a career out of.

You know how all the horror geeks get extra-nervous when someone starts talking about a remake of John Carpenter's The Thing -- despite the fact that (as awesome as it is, and boy is it awesome) it itself is a remake! Doesn't that create some sort of retroactive mega-paradox: That if a REMAKE is that damn good, doesn't it stand as final proof that remakes ARE good?? In theory, anyway. I'm not talking about freakin' Prom Night here.

Anyway, it looks like some loyal monster fans took the job into their own hands, and have thus created their own rendition of The Thing ... using only G.I. Joe action figures. It's really nifty, and the music is pretty cool too.



[ Thanks to CHUD.com for the heads-up. ]