Movie Reviews

A SCIENTIFIC exploration to Antarctica uncovers rather more than it bargained for in The Thing (16s), when a structure is discovered buried deep in the ice.

Initial observations reveal that the specimen removed from the structure is more than 100,000 years old, although the scientists’ professional demeanour is quickly shattered when an alien life-form bursts from the ice and begins to lay waste to all around it.

A remake of the 1982 horror of the same name, The Thing is a very effective thriller, with plenty of twists and turns built on the premise that the alien has the capacity to adopt human form, with Kate Lloyd (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) and her colleagues battling a lethal adversary in a climate of mutual suspicion. The story is essentially Agatha Christie’s Nine Little Indians blended with Ridley Scott’s Alien (1979), and Winstead makes for a very persuasive version of Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley, a resourceful and doughty heroine who keeps her head while all the men around her lose theirs — quite literally, in some cases. This adaptation by director Matthias van Heijningen is perhaps too faithful to the original, but anyone coming fresh to the story can expect expertly executed thrills ‘n’ spills in a tense, doom-laden atmosphere that positively leaks paranoia.