<http://schema.org/articleBody>
" Is it a prequel? Is it a remake? Is it a &amp;#039;prequake&amp;#039;? Whatever hybrid entity the latest version of The Thing is, it offers decent old school horror shocks and enough tension to make derri\u00C3\u00A8res creep towards seat edges. Unsurprisingly, it also fails to emerge from the shadow of two previous and vastly superior &amp;#039;Things&amp;#039;. The sturdy premise of a murderous alien entity terrorising the inhabitants of an Antarctic research base formed the basis of John W. Campbell, Jr&amp;#039;s 1938 novella Who Goes There?, which was previously treated to contrasting cinematic adaptations by Howard Hawks in 1951 and John Carpenter in 1982. The former thrives on an unseen menace and unsubtle political allegory, while the latter faithfully foregrounds body snatching and audacious prosthetic effects. Both are undoubtedly brilliant. Matthijs van Heijningen Jr.&amp;#039;s 2011 take follows closely - often too closely - in the footsteps of Carpenter, with an abundance of flailing tentacles and gross out body horror. Set shortly before Kurt Russell&amp;#039;s first snow-strewn encounter with a possessed canine in 1982, the story follows the recruitment of paleontologist Kate Lloyd (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) for an ill-fated mission to examine an extraterrestrial creature found frozen near its spaceship in the Antarctica. Joining up with a group of Norwegian scientists, Kate is quickly confronted with an overriding sense of paranoia as the alien breaks free and takes over members of the camp before mutating into jawdroppingly gruesome creatures.  What ensues is effectively a retread of the 1982 narrative, with Kate devising a test (albeit not a blood one due to a lack of petri dishes!) to whittle down the possible foes in their midst. But what has become of heroic American helicopter pilot Sam Carter (Joel Edgerton) after he was wrongly presumed dead? The numerous visual homages to Carpenter&amp;#039;s movie often conjure up instant nostalgic thrills, particularly when a dismembered arm sprouts legs in a gory throwback to the spider-head Thing that mesmerised audiences nearly three decades ago.  Yet it makes one crave a viewing of that film instead of the one we&amp;#039;re witnessing unfold, particularly as Heijningen Jr.&amp;#039;s direction lacks Carpenter&amp;#039;s visceral impact and the characters fail to make much of an impression despite Winstead&amp;#039;s valiant attempts to channel Ellen Ripley. This duality of praise and criticism ultimately boils down to a lack of work being put into making this movie stand out on narrative and aesthetic grounds from what has transpired before. Much like the Thing creature parasitically latches onto the identity of other beings, this movie feeds off past ideas and has no apparent desire to shine on its own merits.  Still, we should be grateful that The Thing eschews the dumbed down approach taken by numerous horror movie &amp;#039;reimaginings&amp;#039; in recent years. The admirably serious approach from all the actors also ensures that the dramatic tension is frequently palpable, despite not caring much for the fate of their characters. While this isn&amp;#039;t the fantastical return to Antarctica we craved, its suspenseful and entertaining nature is sufficiently rewarding, with an ending that leads nicely into the film it can&amp;#039;t break free from. Now if only Mr Carpenter can knock up that sequel we nudged him about earlier this year...   "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.digitalspy.com/movies/review/a353576/the-thing-review/>