2.5 stars
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0084787/
this is is a case study in how much better movies have gotten in the last 40 years
i imagine that 40 years ago it was pretty awesome and the effects must have been impressive and scary …
but old movies that relied on special effects and shock factor were never going to age well …
i generally believe for whatever reason old things are over-rated whether it is due to boomerism ( a mild form of dementia ) or some kind of misguided snobbery …
for me “The Thing” was predictable, not scary, boring and pointless.
in general i find old movies to be bad except ones that predicted the future to some extent such as “Soylent Green” for example …
old movies that deal with timeless subjects ( such as sexuality ) can be OK as long they rely on a good script rather than on acting etc … because back then nobody knew how to act
on other hand old movies that relied on innovation in special effects ( such as “The Thing” ) have value only for art students as a reference point to judge how awfully bad movies used to be …
some reviewers claim “The Thing” is “psychological” etc … i’m sorry but i just didn’t feel it. The concept had potential but the execution is so bad ( typical of the times ) that it simply doesn’t work.
movielens predicted 4 stars for me because i gave 5 stars to “They Live” which from algorithmic perspective is almost the same … but “They Live” is about the Jews whereas “The Thing” is about some Alien thing … maybe there is some hidden meaning to “The Thing” as well ? Maybe the Alien is a metaphor for something ?
anyway, the movie just felt tired and boring to me.