The film is set in the Antarctic and revolves around feisty graduate student paleontologist Kate Lloyd (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), who`s roped in by Dr Sander Halvorson (Ulrich Thomsen) to explore the discovery of an alien craft that lands in the Antarctic. Without spoiling too much of the premise for those of you who`ve yet to see the 80s remake, suffice to say that it involves hoary Norwegian researchers (referenced in the first movie), infections, paranoia and flamethrowers. For horror/zombie/Resident Evil fans, that`s probably `nuff said.
Maybe it`s due to the wintry temperature which the movie is set in, but the movie`s first 20 minutes spends more time trying to sputter into gear than it does setting up either plot or characters.The result is that there`s hardly any sense of identity within the motley assortment of researchers, who`re largely interchangeable. This may actually be a good thing, considering the relatively high casualty rate, and the grotesque nature of the alien/s (which are positively Lovecraftian).
Most of us, though, don`t go into horror movies for the sensitive character development, rather than to get the bejeezus scared out of us. I`m thus happy to report that The Thing, while not breaking new ground, does feature most of the traits of a good horror flick, with its creepy score, clever lulls in suspense, horrific monster design, paranoia-inducing premise and decent (if well-trodden) camera work. Even the plot would have been decent, if only they hadn`t featured that ludicrous bit with the dental investigationâ€