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December 23, 2016

Special Report: The Thing (1982)

Special Guests: John Kenneth Muir, Jez Conolly, Dean Cundey, Joel Polis, Thomas G. Waites
Guest Co-Hosts: El Goro, Patrick Bromley

Initially lambasted by critics, John Carpenter's The Thing (1982) was a brilliant adaptation of John W. Campbell's novella Who Goes There?. The film tells the story of a dozen men in Antarctica who are infiltrated by an alien shapeshifter.

Interviews include authors John Kenneth Muir (The Films of John Carpenter), Jez Conolly (Devil’s Advocates: The Thing), actors Joel Polis (Fuchs), Thomas G. Waites (Windows), and cinematographer Dean Cundey.

Patrick Bromley of the F This Movie podcast and El Goro of the Talk Without Rhythm podcast join Mike on this very special episode.

Listen/Download Now:

Bonus Interview with Stuart Cohen:
Direct Link

Links:
Buy The Thing on Blu-Ray with a commentary from El Goro, Patrick Bromley, and Mike White (UK Release)
Buy The Thing on Blu-Ray (US Release)
Buy The Films of John Carpenter by John Kenneth Muir
Buy Devil's Advocates: The Thing by Jez Connelly
Buy The Thing (BFI Modern Classics) by Anne Billson
Visit Stuart Cohen's website
Visit the Joel Polis website
Visit the Thomas G. Waites website
Visit Jez Conolly's official website
Visit John Kenneth Muir's blog
Watch ‘Big John’: A 75-Minute Precious Exploration of John Carpenter’s Life, Work and Ways
Read John Carpenter's The Thing had an Icy Critical Reception
Visit Outpost31.com
Read Ennio Morricone’s unused score for The Thing ended up in The Hateful Eight by Ben Kaye
Listen to Special "The Thing" Commentary for Patricia Stevens by The After Movie Diner
Read The Men Who Were 'The Thing' Look Back on a Modern Horror Classic by Simon Abrams and Matt Zoller Seitz
Listen to the The Thing Read Along Book
Here more from Dean Cundey on The Projection Booth
Listen to our interview with Keith David
Hear more Patrick Bromley on F This Movie!
Hear more El Goro on Talk Without Rhythm

Music:
"Burn It" - Ennio Morricone
"Bestiality" - Ennio Morricone
"Fuchs" - Ennio Morricone
"The Thing that was Bennings" - Ennio Morricone
"Desolation (Main Theme)" - Ennio Morricone
That Thing" - Who Ha
"I Know I'm Human" - Beckett

Watch:












The Hateful Thing from KINO on Vimeo.

5 comments:

  1. Regarding THE THING 2011 - Requel (remake/seq/pre/quel)- emphasis on the REEK...

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  2. Another stellar job from The Booth!

    One 'thing' that didn't come up in the discussion; in 2010, author Peter Watts wrote the short story, "The Things", which recounts the events in the Carpenter film from the one perspective not at all covered - the title characters'.
    Very interesting, the story caused some controversy in some circles.

    The story - http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/watts_01_10/

    Audio reading - https://youtu.be/h-G-k9-y1NA

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqQ99s4Ywnw

      Delete
  3. Eurotrash Maximilian the 3rdJan 4, 2017, 10:57:00 AM

    Why special report? It's an awesome full fledged episode just like most of PB's "regular" episodes. Great job on getting all those interviews as well. And yeah, while the producer's interview is not 100 percent intelligible, most of it still is. In fact, I'd say it's way more intelligible than for example the Bad Timing Nick Rogue interview.

    The Hateful Eight video has a point. I too was reminded of The Thing when they got to the cottage. And there's the Morricone connection as well. Kurt talks about it a bit as well:
    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/kurt-russell-the-thing-theory_us_56883db0e4b014efe0daaaff

    Here's a couple more fun The Thing videos:

    The Thing Cast Watches the Prequel
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYjDVCwKr6A
    :)

    Vintage VHS Promo/Making of Featurette from 1982
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qk1mLv8_DiA
    My God how young they all are. Kurt still looks like a kid in a grown man's suit.

    The Thing deleted scenes + alternate ending
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Xu2cFljkPw
    The infamous bwana line is in this. The other scene where Blair explains the alien nature of The Thing's cell structure could've been kept in. I'm not sure why they claim that the dog in the snow scene is an alternate ending... Because it's not.

    The 2013 blog of one of the producers is still up and he explains in some detail there the truth behind the alternate ending(s) story and how 3 percent of some random preview audience almost gave us the ending without Childs:
    http://theoriginalfan.blogspot.rs/2011/10/ending-you-almost-saw.html
    He also explains what the crew thought on the whole "is Childs the Thing" issue.

    Since Mike and his co-hosts talk about the same alternate ending with MacReady and the test that the guy mentions here, does anyone know where that footage can actually be seen? The producer thought it was lost since it was never meant to be used.

    By the way, did you mention Harbinger Down or did I miss that part of the episode somehow?

    Oh, end happy New Year Mike and PB. May your episodes be great as this one and your Patron wallets as full as The Thing is with paranoia.

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  4. The same story by Campbell was also adapted (loosely) by an episode of the X-Files. I thought that was pretty well done.

    ReplyDelete