When a Thing copies someone, it copies them completely. So Things breathe, just like we do. When a Thing copied Norris and became Norris-Thing, it even copied his heart condition, which is why Norris-Thing ended up having a heart attack.
According to cinematographer Dean Cundey, they intentionally did a lighting trick where a human has a gleam in their eye and a Thing does not. You can see this when the men are tied to the couch. Childs and Gary have a gleam in their eye, but Palmer does not.
In the final scene, MacReady has a gleam in his eye (though it’s not as obvious as in previous scenes like the blood test scene). Childs does not. So, case closed, right? Well, not so fast. Cundey also said that when they discussed the final scene, John Carpenter wanted the question of who was a Thing to be ambiguous, so they didn’t follow their gleam rule for that scene. Any eye gleam present in that scene is not their intentional lighting trick and is just coincidental.
The actor who played Norris also said that he tried to play it as if he was uncertain if he was a Thing or not (talk about paranoia)-maybe partly why he refused leadership, alongside the heart condition and general personality?
Um, what? The Norwegians only spoke Norwegian. The pilot got blowed up in the first five minutes and the scientist got shot in the eye a minute after that.
I loved the original one. The build up was slow and measured, and you got a very realistic look at how people react in times like that. Great acting too.
Yeah, that’s the complaint. A Norwegian assigned to an Arctic post is almost guaranteed to speak really good English, and wouldn’t have to shout at the Americans about the dog in Norwegian.
I’m guessing those dudes have probably spent the last couple days running on adrenaline, pure terror, and absolutely no sleep, though, so I don’t blame the guy for reflexively using his native language in a high stress moment.
One thing that’s always bugged me about that opening chase scene - the helicopter is making high speed passes over the dog-thing, taking potshots at it. Um, hello? You’re in a helicopter. Hover, fer crissakes! It’s still an improbable shot, but much less so than the high-speed thing.
I’m sure they were hoping, praying, and calling upon all the powers that be that they’d stop it BEFORE it got to the base. Obsessed with that no less.
And yeah, as @Miller says, they’re panicked, exhausted, and probably been stewing in paranoia, fear and exhaustion for days prior to the events. Note their other failures (crit fail!) that caused them to seize defeat from the jaws of victory!
The dog is running at top speed, which while much slower than the helicopter can fly is still a moving target that will be out of close range in a few seconds, and is white enough to disappear into the snow, so they want to keep it in eyesight. It’s also kind of dangerous to hover close to the ground, especially in a nearly featureless landscape and with any amount of wind where the pilot can become disoriented. A moving helicopter is much more stable and less effected by vortex ring effects.
I love the fact that the guy pulls the pin on the grenade and then it slips out of his gloved hand, which is exactly the sort of fumble that occurs in an arctic (or in this case, Antarctic) environment. I’m not sure how far he thought we was going to throw that grenade but they were clearly in a panic about letting ‘The Thing’ get loose in another base.
However, even though the crew of “Science Station #4” didn’t understand what the Norwegians were saying, it is clear that they really wanted that dog dead, and why the Americans weren’t suspicious that it might be infected with rabies or another disease is unclear. Instead, they foolishly let it roam free in the station and then kennel it with the other dogs. If they didn’t, I guess you wouldn’t have a movie but it’s the one quasi-logical lapse in the movie.
The less said about the unnecessary 2011 film, the better.
Speaking of the 2011 film ;-p, it established that the Norwegian so called “scientist” that flew over on the helicopter to the American outpost wasn’t a scientist at all. More of a laborer who definitely did not speak English.
The helo also wants to stay high enough that the rotor downwash doesn’t envelop the target in an opaque swirling cloud of blown snow. Moving with the target lets you get lower since the downwash and ensuing cloud is behind you / it. But not too low or the cloud catches up to you no matter how fast you’re going.
Funny, one night I watched a triple header of Scott Pilgrim vs the World, The Thing 2011, and Deathproof. It wasn’t until Deathproof that I realized she was in all three! I think I had a subconscious crush on her.
Yeah, except her character’s presence in the film makes no sense. In fact, little about that movie makes any sense, and it lacks any degree of tension or suspense even setting aside how poorly the CGI compares in creep factor to the Rob Bottin and Sam Winston’s practical effects, especially the dog. It’s a classic case of people taking something that worked and trying to recreate the exact same story with just superficial changes except not understanding what made it work so effectively the first time.