We’ve all been curious about Universal Pictures’ decision to postpone THE THING‘s release. Some of us wondered whether or not it was a bad sign; even when producer Eric Newman revealed that extra shooting was going down to help improve the movie, one had to consider the possibility that Newman was just throwing sand on a fire of potentially bad press.
No matter the real reason, Universal hasn’t let THE THING founder in the dreaded TBD department for long: the studio has bestowed an OCTOBER 14, 2011 release date upon the film. Yes, right around Halloweentime is when we’ll get to check out Matthijs van Heijningen, Jr.’s vision for THE THING prequel, a fitting time indeed. There’s no real competition on that date (unless you count FOOTLOOSE and THE THREE MUSKETEERS), but the week after brings the third PARANORMAL ACTIVITY movie. Should be an interesting showdown.
Here’s how THE THING prequel breaks down: Antarctica: an extraordinary continent of awesome beauty. It is also home to an isolated outpost where a discovery full of scientific possibility becomes a mission of survival when an alien is unearthed by a crew of international scientists. The shape-shifting creature, accidentally unleashed at this marooned colony, has the ability to turn itself into a perfect replica of any living being. It can look just like you or me, but inside, it remains inhuman. In the thriller THE THING, paranoia spreads like an epidemic among a group of researchers as they’re infected, one by one, by a mystery from another planet. Paleontologist Kate Lloyd (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) has traveled to the desolate region for the expedition of her lifetime. Joining a Norwegian scientific team that has stumbled across an extraterrestrial ship buried in the ice, she discovers an organism that seems to have died in the crash eons ago. But it is about to wake up. When a simple experiment frees the alien from its frozen prison, Kate must join the crew’s pilot, Carter (Joel Edgerton), to keep it from killing them off one at a time. And in this vast, intense land, a parasite that can mimic anything it touches will pit human against human as it tries to survive and flourish.
If you haven’t already, give my report from the set of THE THING a peek right HERE.
Mary Elizabeth Winstead