John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982) is lauded as a horror masterpiece – utilizing terrifying creature effects and a well-paced plot to keep audiences at the edge of their seats. For the few of you who have lived under a horror-free rock for the past few decades, the plot is this: Scientists in the Antarctic are confronted by a shape-shifting alien that assumes the appearance of the people that it kills.
Now in this article, we’re not talking about that Thing, I am talking about the other thing, The Thing – the prequel. In a confusing title choice, 2011 gave us a prequel to The Thing called, well, The Thing. Although many had high hopes for the film, the final result was a bit of a letdown.
One of the major aspects creating the film’s hype was that director Matthijs van Heijningen Jr. insisted upon using practical effects for the various alien transformations. With the trend towards (often cheesy) digital effects in horror, fans were excited this wide release film would return to real effects.
Amalgamated Dynamics, Inc. was hired to create the animatronics, latex costumes, and other practical effects for the film. Their hard work is showcased in this video which chronicles their products from pre-production to their final incarnations on set:
Want another 15 minutes of slides detailing their work?
How about on-set footage of the Edvard-Adam Thing?
Awesome, right? Even with a poor script the movie should have been salvageable just because of these cool effects. I know just watching the above videos has caused me to sleep with a nightlight (and a flamethrower) for the past few nights.
Well, in the post-production process, the studio decided that computer-generated images would be used to “enhance” these practical special effects. Enhancements in and of themselves are not particularly egregious mistakes (in fact, when used in moderation they can truly work in tandem with practical effects), but entirely replacing certain animatronics with digital effects certainly was.
Of course, there are many reasons filmmakers use digital effects and CGI, and many times it is the only option to tell the story they are trying to tell – it just isn’t cost effective to build actual cars that turn into giant robots for Transformers . It is, however, a shame that many of Amalgamated Dynamics, Inc. creations were hid behind CGI and that some were completely removed from the finished film.
At least ADI released their behind-the-scenes videos, so everyone can appreciate their work – and have a few extra alien-related nightmares.
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