1
00:00:22,272 --> 00:00:26,317
<i>- U.S. Number 31 calling McMurdo.</i>
<i>Come in. Over.</i>

2
00:00:28,820 --> 00:00:31,531
<i>- U.S. Number 31 calling McMurdo. Urgent.</i>

3
00:00:31,614 --> 00:00:32,866
<i>Come in. Over.</i>

4
00:00:41,166 --> 00:00:44,711
<i>The Thing</i> was um, my first studio movie.

5
00:00:44,794 --> 00:00:46,629
It was a huge opportunity.

6
00:00:48,006 --> 00:00:50,925
It was released and hated.

7
00:00:52,594 --> 00:00:55,930
- I went to see <i>The Thing</i> opening weekend.

8
00:00:56,014 --> 00:00:57,640
I went with a group of friends,

9
00:00:57,724 --> 00:01:00,894
and the entire theater hated
the movie, except me.

10
00:01:02,645 --> 00:01:05,648
I was reading old reviews of the film.

11
00:01:05,732 --> 00:01:06,941
They crushed it.

12
00:01:10,487 --> 00:01:12,989
It was like a hostile reaction
to the film.

13
00:01:13,072 --> 00:01:15,450
And really vitriolic toward John,
personally.

14
00:01:15,533 --> 00:01:18,661
<i>It is the most nauseating thing</i>
<i>I've ever seen on a movie screen.</i>

15
00:01:21,414 --> 00:01:23,750
My agent was you know was like,
forget about <i>The Thing</i>.

16
00:01:23,833 --> 00:01:25,585
<i>What if we're wrong about him?</i>

17
00:01:25,668 --> 00:01:27,045
<i>Well, then, we're wrong.</i>

18
00:01:27,128 --> 00:01:30,006
It's a desperate movie without any hope.

19
00:01:30,089 --> 00:01:32,550
<i>What can we do? What can we do?</i>

20
00:01:32,634 --> 00:01:35,386
- I thought we had made
a really wonderful film

21
00:01:35,470 --> 00:01:39,432
that was gonna do really well
until Universal threw it away.

22
00:01:39,516 --> 00:01:42,310
<i>- All right. Uh, as far as…</i>

23
00:01:48,817 --> 00:01:50,527
- The great thing about horror
is that the canon

24
00:01:50,610 --> 00:01:52,028
is decided democratically.

25
00:01:52,111 --> 00:01:54,781
Ultimately, we're the ones
who decide what the classics are.

26
00:01:57,033 --> 00:02:00,161
There were a lot of people
who went, "Whoa,

27
00:02:00,245 --> 00:02:01,830
wait a minute, I think
I really like that."

28
00:02:01,913 --> 00:02:06,084
It was crazy, but that became,
"Wait a minute, wait a minute,

29
00:02:06,167 --> 00:02:07,919
wait a minute, wait a minute, wait, wait."

30
00:02:10,922 --> 00:02:13,508
- Those of us who had the foresight

31
00:02:13,591 --> 00:02:16,386
to recognize <i>The Thing</i>
as a brilliant piece

32
00:02:16,469 --> 00:02:18,847
of filmmaking have shared that opinion.

33
00:02:18,930 --> 00:02:25,144
It's been 42 years and I'm not sure
that I get the film, yet.

34
00:02:25,228 --> 00:02:27,730
<i>You've got to be fucking kidding.</i>

35
00:02:27,814 --> 00:02:30,108
Time is the only critic that matters.

36
00:02:30,191 --> 00:02:33,862
So whatever happened at the moment
of release, it's irrelevant.

37
00:02:33,945 --> 00:02:37,490
Here we are talking about <i>The Thing</i>
as the masterpiece it is.

38
00:02:40,118 --> 00:02:43,997
- But then to see it over years
become the icon that it has,

39
00:02:44,080 --> 00:02:47,250
it kind of goes, "Fuck you guys",
you know?

40
00:02:48,418 --> 00:02:52,005
<i>- This thing doesn't want to show itself.</i>
<i>It wants to hide inside an imitation.</i>

41
00:02:52,088 --> 00:02:56,676
- Now uh, alarmed, scared, happy,
whatever their reactions are.

42
00:02:57,802 --> 00:02:59,762
But it's a powerful movie.

43
00:02:59,846 --> 00:03:01,848
<i>We're gonna find out who's who.</i>

44
00:03:01,931 --> 00:03:03,975
Just a little ahead of its time maybe.

45
00:03:55,568 --> 00:03:59,572
- The novella that John Campbell is famous
for, <i>Who Goes There?</i>

46
00:03:59,656 --> 00:04:02,867
was actually under a pseudonym,
Don Stuart.

47
00:04:04,827 --> 00:04:09,707
It was a golden age uh, uh, pulp story.

48
00:04:09,791 --> 00:04:13,544
So it was all bronzed heroes and all this.

49
00:04:13,628 --> 00:04:16,673
But the central idea was unbelievable.

50
00:04:16,756 --> 00:04:21,094
This creature from the stars who--
who can imitate anything.

51
00:04:22,553 --> 00:04:26,933
And it comes down, crash lands,
and when you let it out,

52
00:04:27,016 --> 00:04:28,685
it starts to imitate us.

53
00:04:30,436 --> 00:04:32,897
- The short story, of course,
works from the internal.

54
00:04:32,981 --> 00:04:38,111
The operative line, "Is the man next to me
an inhuman monster?", quote unquote.

55
00:04:39,404 --> 00:04:41,864
Seemed like a fine idea for a movie to me.

56
00:04:44,075 --> 00:04:47,328
- Going back and reading that novella
gave a-- an appreciation

57
00:04:47,412 --> 00:04:50,623
for how much more faithful Carpenter
was to that.

58
00:04:50,707 --> 00:04:57,130
And how skilled he was at picking out
what was scary about that story.

59
00:05:00,591 --> 00:05:05,638
John W. Campbell Jr. was the editor of
one of those science fiction uh, magazines

60
00:05:05,722 --> 00:05:11,352
that flourished in the uh, '30s, '40s,
and '50s particularly.

61
00:05:11,436 --> 00:05:14,647
A lot of famous
science-fiction writers got

62
00:05:14,731 --> 00:05:18,568
their start in these magazines
by selling their stories.

63
00:05:19,569 --> 00:05:24,699
But Campbell himself wrote the story
on which <i>The Thing</i> is based.

64
00:05:26,576 --> 00:05:30,038
- It was in a volume
of short stories called,

65
00:05:30,121 --> 00:05:31,873
"<i>Adventures in Time and Space</i>".

66
00:05:31,956 --> 00:05:34,375
Which included, you know,
the best short stories,

67
00:05:34,459 --> 00:05:36,586
you know, written to date at that time.

68
00:05:36,669 --> 00:05:41,049
Isaac Asimov's <i>Nightfall</i>,
<i>He Who Shrank</i>, Henry Hasse's.

69
00:05:41,132 --> 00:05:44,260
<i>Farewell to the Master</i>,
Harry Bates' short story

70
00:05:44,343 --> 00:05:46,804
that became <i>The Day the Earth Stood Still</i>.

71
00:05:48,264 --> 00:05:50,600
Almost among, though, however,
was <i>Who Goes There?</i>

72
00:05:52,477 --> 00:05:54,896
- The origin of the original story,

73
00:05:54,979 --> 00:05:57,815
if I remember it correctly, Campbell
uh, came back

74
00:05:57,899 --> 00:06:02,612
to his home and he saw his mother
washing dishes.

75
00:06:02,695 --> 00:06:06,491
And he had the distinct feeling that
that was not his mother.

76
00:06:08,367 --> 00:06:13,706
- His mother had a twin sister
who absolutely hated him by all accounts.

77
00:06:13,790 --> 00:06:16,959
And he just grew up
with this absolute paranoia

78
00:06:17,043 --> 00:06:18,669
of not knowing, "Is it my mother

79
00:06:18,753 --> 00:06:21,172
or is it this other woman
that does not like me?"

80
00:06:23,007 --> 00:06:25,009
- I've heard that Carpenter
denies that it has

81
00:06:25,093 --> 00:06:28,387
any influence of Lovecraftian situations.

82
00:06:28,471 --> 00:06:31,724
But <i>Mountains of Madness</i>
is right there, right?

83
00:06:31,808 --> 00:06:35,394
And Campbell himself
was part of this universe.

84
00:06:35,478 --> 00:06:40,274
And-- and this unknowable,
indescribable horrors

85
00:06:40,358 --> 00:06:42,944
is very much in line with cosmic horror.

86
00:06:44,779 --> 00:06:47,824
Lovecraft was the first author I read
where there's these

87
00:06:47,907 --> 00:06:51,327
eldritch gods, you know, demigods.

88
00:06:51,410 --> 00:06:55,540
That were roughly as much
of an octopus as a human being.

89
00:06:55,623 --> 00:07:00,419
That I think evoked something,
again, really primal, a primal fear.

90
00:07:03,047 --> 00:07:04,882
- The Hawks film wasn't the short story.

91
00:07:04,966 --> 00:07:07,802
The Hawks film, you know, dealt
with an external monster.

92
00:07:07,885 --> 00:07:11,139
A giant carrot that uh,
would menace the people.

93
00:07:14,767 --> 00:07:18,938
One of the things that John did
was screen the original <i>Thing</i> for us.

94
00:07:19,689 --> 00:07:21,858
And it was such a different vibe.

95
00:07:27,655 --> 00:07:31,993
<i>The Thing From Another World</i> kind of sits
between the old universal horror films

96
00:07:32,076 --> 00:07:35,329
and this new age, the science fiction age.

97
00:07:35,413 --> 00:07:36,622
<i>-Easy. -Here we go.</i>

98
00:07:36,706 --> 00:07:37,874
<i>- Keep it going.</i>

99
00:07:37,957 --> 00:07:38,875
<i>- Keep it going.</i>

100
00:07:38,958 --> 00:07:43,462
It was so propagandistic that it was like,
"Oh, come on, guys."

101
00:07:43,546 --> 00:07:47,008
I mean, aliens are one thing,
and-- and-- but you're trying

102
00:07:47,091 --> 00:07:50,928
to equate that to another power.

103
00:07:51,012 --> 00:07:53,681
A government power threatening us. Eh.

104
00:07:57,185 --> 00:08:01,522
The Howard Hawks idea of people
banding together

105
00:08:01,606 --> 00:08:05,776
against a-- a common foe
and everybody being a community.

106
00:08:05,860 --> 00:08:08,487
There's a sort of humanity in it.

107
00:08:08,571 --> 00:08:09,363
<i>-Hold it, doctor.</i>
<i>-We must--</i>

108
00:08:09,447 --> 00:08:12,450
<i>You'll freeze to death out there</i>
<i>in five minutes. Use your head!</i>

109
00:08:12,533 --> 00:08:15,661
It was scary. That was the big thing.

110
00:08:15,745 --> 00:08:19,957
There's a couple scenes
that are just unbelievable.

111
00:08:20,041 --> 00:08:22,627
You know, the jump. Popcorn goes flying.

112
00:08:26,464 --> 00:08:29,759
When Arness blasts that door open

113
00:08:29,842 --> 00:08:34,805
and then takes his step into the--
into the doorway.

114
00:08:34,889 --> 00:08:37,725
And you see him clearing
all this stuff away

115
00:08:37,808 --> 00:08:39,393
like it's made out of nothing.

116
00:08:39,477 --> 00:08:41,938
<i>And know what I'm trying to tell you.</i>
<i>I'm not your enemy. I'm a scientist.</i>

117
00:08:42,021 --> 00:08:43,606
<i>I'm a scientist who's trying…</i>

118
00:08:46,234 --> 00:08:50,821
- The reason you see the movie
that's going on in <i>Halloween</i>

119
00:08:50,905 --> 00:08:53,950
is because that was a videotape
that I had.

120
00:08:57,870 --> 00:09:02,750
I really loved how Carpenter
recreated that title sequence.

121
00:09:02,833 --> 00:09:05,920
You saw the homage to the original.

122
00:09:07,296 --> 00:09:11,008
They're two very different takes
on the same premise.

123
00:09:11,092 --> 00:09:12,927
Uh, in that sense, I've always viewed it

124
00:09:13,010 --> 00:09:16,889
sort of like the original <i>Fly</i>
and then David Cronenberg's <i>Fly</i>.

125
00:09:19,433 --> 00:09:20,309
<i>Help me.</i>

126
00:09:20,393 --> 00:09:22,270
You never thought about
remaking a Hawks film.

127
00:09:22,353 --> 00:09:26,482
Neither did John Carpenter.
It was always about making <i>Who Goes There?</i>

128
00:09:26,565 --> 00:09:29,360
- It's not as much a question
as it is a command.

129
00:09:29,443 --> 00:09:30,653
"Who goes there?"

130
00:09:30,736 --> 00:09:33,197
And if you don't answer right,
they're gonna start shooting.

131
00:09:33,281 --> 00:09:36,450
You don't know the password.
You didn't say the right thing.

132
00:09:37,535 --> 00:09:39,453
In this environment, in this story,

133
00:09:39,537 --> 00:09:42,039
<i>Who Goes There?</i> is on everybody's mind.

134
00:09:43,958 --> 00:09:46,752
- Now John had also just made
a deal, as I know.

135
00:09:46,836 --> 00:09:49,380
A two-telefilm deal at Warner Brothers.

136
00:09:49,463 --> 00:09:52,967
Two TV movies.
Uh, he was already at work on them.

137
00:09:53,050 --> 00:09:56,512
So we're left with a project
without John initially doing it.

138
00:09:59,015 --> 00:10:02,518
Universal had signed Tobe Hooper
and Kim Henkel

139
00:10:02,601 --> 00:10:04,729
to a development deal at the studio.

140
00:10:06,147 --> 00:10:09,525
Their work was to be shepherded
by William Friedkin.

141
00:10:10,568 --> 00:10:13,571
For me, in a world in which John Carpenter
temporarily didn't exist,

142
00:10:13,654 --> 00:10:15,948
I mean, Tobe would be a terrific idea.

143
00:10:16,032 --> 00:10:20,745
I'd seen <i>Texas Chainsaw Massacre</i> and
laughed all the way through it actually.

144
00:10:20,828 --> 00:10:24,707
They were not particularly interested
in doing a short story.

145
00:10:24,790 --> 00:10:27,001
They went off and wrote a script
very quickly.

146
00:10:27,084 --> 00:10:29,962
It was sort of a nightmare
involving a character

147
00:10:30,046 --> 00:10:34,300
like they called, "The Captain".
And it was more like <i>Moby-Dick</i>.

148
00:10:34,383 --> 00:10:36,135
I remember very little else about it.

149
00:10:40,890 --> 00:10:46,979
Tobe Hooper, I think, would have gone more
for grim splatter.

150
00:10:47,063 --> 00:10:50,107
Mind you, the splatter's
pretty grim as it is.

151
00:10:50,191 --> 00:10:52,735
He certainly got the same sensibility
of Carpenter

152
00:10:52,818 --> 00:10:56,238
in that they're both kind of '70s guys

153
00:10:56,322 --> 00:10:59,784
whose films are uncompromising.

154
00:11:00,659 --> 00:11:03,621
See, another director they had
under contract at the time,

155
00:11:03,704 --> 00:11:05,456
Universal, and that was John Landis.

156
00:11:07,792 --> 00:11:11,420
John was editing Animal House,
actually, so we went to see it.

157
00:11:13,506 --> 00:11:15,508
- His version would have been interesting.

158
00:11:15,591 --> 00:11:18,552
I'm not sure he can do something
straight-faced.

159
00:11:20,471 --> 00:11:21,764
<i>Can I have a piece of toast?</i>

160
00:11:24,100 --> 00:11:27,436
- I'd attended a preview screening
at Paramount

161
00:11:27,520 --> 00:11:30,106
of <i>The Bad News Bears</i>,
before it had been released,

162
00:11:30,189 --> 00:11:32,274
which I thought was terrific.

163
00:11:32,358 --> 00:11:34,026
And people have asked me in the past,
"How did, you know,

164
00:11:34,110 --> 00:11:36,695
Bill Lancaster come about for this?"

165
00:11:36,779 --> 00:11:38,697
That really was the answer.

166
00:11:38,781 --> 00:11:40,157
Good writing is good writing.

167
00:11:40,825 --> 00:11:42,034
BILL LANCASTER

168
00:11:42,118 --> 00:11:45,121
- Bill Lancaster, who was the son
of Burt Lancaster,

169
00:11:45,204 --> 00:11:47,456
and by all accounts had
a very unhappy life,

170
00:11:47,540 --> 00:11:51,377
but he introduced something
which we weren't that used to

171
00:11:51,460 --> 00:11:56,674
at the time in the early '80s,
which was irreverence in the dialogue.

172
00:11:57,716 --> 00:12:00,052
People talking like they normally talk.

173
00:12:00,719 --> 00:12:03,806
They make jokes about serious things.

174
00:12:06,434 --> 00:12:10,020
Bill Lancaster, the writer, I think,
did incredible job.

175
00:12:10,104 --> 00:12:12,523
Like he's a unsung hero on that film,

176
00:12:12,606 --> 00:12:17,987
because the construction of that film is--
is very precise.

177
00:12:18,070 --> 00:12:21,240
It was an extremely tight screenplay.

178
00:12:21,323 --> 00:12:22,491
It just moved.

179
00:12:22,575 --> 00:12:26,871
It releases these moments, which continue

180
00:12:26,954 --> 00:12:31,709
to increase the paranoia
until the unveiling of what it is.

181
00:12:31,792 --> 00:12:33,294
It's like <i>Jaws</i>.

182
00:12:38,340 --> 00:12:40,968
And that project lay dormant
for about a year.

183
00:12:42,428 --> 00:12:46,557
There was something coming down
the way, in about a year's time,

184
00:12:46,640 --> 00:12:48,392
that was gonna make the case for us.

185
00:12:55,649 --> 00:12:58,569
I went to the second showing of <i>Alien</i>
at the Egyptian Theatre

186
00:12:58,652 --> 00:13:02,490
in Hollywood on May 25th, 1979.

187
00:13:02,573 --> 00:13:03,449
Loved it.

188
00:13:06,911 --> 00:13:09,455
- Angry, because I thought
it had gotten there before us,

189
00:13:09,538 --> 00:13:11,040
but excited nonetheless.

190
00:13:15,127 --> 00:13:17,379
<i>Alien</i> definitely opened doors

191
00:13:17,463 --> 00:13:20,549
to serious science-fiction horror.

192
00:13:23,469 --> 00:13:26,764
And we unabashedly sold this movie
to Universal, you know,

193
00:13:26,847 --> 00:13:29,225
as the next <i>Alien</i>.

194
00:13:29,308 --> 00:13:31,810
And by that, I don't mean
in terms of plot, story

195
00:13:31,894 --> 00:13:34,396
or anything else,
but in terms of box office.

196
00:13:34,480 --> 00:13:36,357
<i>…Way. The other way, God.</i>

197
00:13:40,778 --> 00:13:43,030
- When he finally delivered the script,
first thing I do,

198
00:13:43,113 --> 00:13:45,908
I-- I put it down and I call John.

199
00:13:45,991 --> 00:13:47,284
"What do you think?"

200
00:13:47,368 --> 00:13:48,994
And he said uh,

201
00:13:49,078 --> 00:13:51,372
"I think it's one of the best scripts
I've ever read."

202
00:13:52,248 --> 00:13:54,875
And I said, "Well, are you in?"

203
00:13:54,959 --> 00:13:58,837
And there was a pause and he said uh,
"Oh yeah, yeah, I'm in."

204
00:14:00,339 --> 00:14:01,799
Words we needed to hear.

205
00:14:03,217 --> 00:14:08,264
After <i>Escape from New York</i>,
I was approached by Universal

206
00:14:08,347 --> 00:14:11,308
to work on <i>The Thing</i>.

207
00:14:11,392 --> 00:14:14,144
And I had mixed feelings,

208
00:14:14,228 --> 00:14:16,647
because I so revered the original.

209
00:14:19,358 --> 00:14:24,947
John had a disdain for the conglomerate
kind of filmmaking that was going on.

210
00:14:25,864 --> 00:14:29,743
He plays the curmudgeon,
and he is a bit of a curmudgeon,

211
00:14:29,827 --> 00:14:34,164
but he's also a true student of-- of film.

212
00:14:36,458 --> 00:14:37,835
- You know, a lot of people
don't know this,

213
00:14:37,918 --> 00:14:41,463
but the biggest influence on <i>Alien</i>
is <i>Dark Star</i>.

214
00:14:41,547 --> 00:14:43,132
<i>Your GHF reading is minus 15.</i>

215
00:14:43,215 --> 00:14:44,383
<i>-Doolittle.</i>
<i>-Yeah.</i>

216
00:14:44,466 --> 00:14:45,217
<i>I need a…</i>

217
00:14:45,301 --> 00:14:48,220
That is an alien that gets on a ship,
and yes,

218
00:14:48,304 --> 00:14:52,016
it's an inflatable beach ball,
but <i>Dark Star</i> does become

219
00:14:52,099 --> 00:14:53,809
the blueprint for <i>Alien</i>.

220
00:14:57,855 --> 00:14:59,607
- <i>Assault on Precinct 13</i>

221
00:14:59,690 --> 00:15:04,445
was like the archetypal Howard Hawks,
people banding together

222
00:15:04,528 --> 00:15:05,988
against a common foe.

223
00:15:09,033 --> 00:15:11,910
So he's already got people
in a limited space.

224
00:15:17,082 --> 00:15:19,627
<i>Halloween</i> was his Hitchcock movie.

225
00:15:24,965 --> 00:15:27,635
The thing that impressed me
about John first,

226
00:15:27,718 --> 00:15:31,055
before the film, was a-- a profile

227
00:15:31,138 --> 00:15:35,517
in the New Yorker magazine about John
and about Halloween.

228
00:15:35,601 --> 00:15:40,356
And it was about how a minimum
of money could result

229
00:15:40,439 --> 00:15:45,653
in a tremendous financial success
if you're good enough at telling a story.

230
00:15:49,948 --> 00:15:51,950
And then my career was set.

231
00:15:52,951 --> 00:15:54,953
Then I became the horror guy.

232
00:15:58,374 --> 00:15:59,667
<i>Who is that?</i>

233
00:15:59,750 --> 00:16:00,959
- And then <i>The Fog</i>.

234
00:16:01,043 --> 00:16:04,046
It's the sort of classic ghost story
in a way.

235
00:16:09,343 --> 00:16:14,723
<i>Escape from New York</i> is pure speculative,
ridiculous science fiction.

236
00:16:17,351 --> 00:16:19,186
By the time he gets to <i>The Thing</i>,

237
00:16:19,269 --> 00:16:22,940
he's taken all these ideas on board
that he's worked out

238
00:16:23,023 --> 00:16:26,819
in his other films, and he kind of
puts them all to work at once.

239
00:16:28,070 --> 00:16:31,740
- John negotiated then
in his contract the ability

240
00:16:31,824 --> 00:16:36,120
to hire uh, three people, Larry Franco,
uh Dean Cundey,

241
00:16:36,203 --> 00:16:39,748
and his editor, Todd Ramsay,
as a way of insurance.

242
00:16:39,832 --> 00:16:44,336
He went into this with a-- with a big
universal-sized chip on his shoulder.

243
00:16:56,640 --> 00:17:00,519
- You could just start with the helicopter
flying in and the dogs.

244
00:17:00,602 --> 00:17:03,230
And if you weren't familiar
with the original <i>Thing</i>

245
00:17:03,313 --> 00:17:05,566
or <i>Who Goes There?</i>,
which probably most people

246
00:17:05,649 --> 00:17:09,903
who saw it weren't, that's one place
to start the film and let it develop.

247
00:17:10,779 --> 00:17:13,574
But when you start with the spaceship,
you know

248
00:17:13,657 --> 00:17:17,911
we're going to go someplace way different.

249
00:17:17,995 --> 00:17:22,958
And it sets up a level of expectation
that is-- is very powerful.

250
00:17:23,876 --> 00:17:26,795
It's this metamorphosis
and this slow appearance

251
00:17:26,879 --> 00:17:29,381
and this strange happenings.

252
00:17:30,841 --> 00:17:35,929
Uh, it's a very clever narrative
construction, uh, often overlooked.

253
00:18:16,512 --> 00:18:18,722
Every person I've ever watched this with

254
00:18:18,806 --> 00:18:22,476
who hadn't seen it before starts
that movie and goes,

255
00:18:22,559 --> 00:18:24,061
"Why are they shooting at that dog?"

256
00:18:29,650 --> 00:18:33,111
It's just a dog,
which makes it really clear-cut.

257
00:18:33,195 --> 00:18:35,656
Make sure that that dog
doesn't reach the camp.

258
00:18:35,739 --> 00:18:37,574
Like that's-- that's the premise,
basically.

259
00:18:37,658 --> 00:18:41,954
And it's so beautifully efficient
and-- and linear.

260
00:18:45,791 --> 00:18:47,417
I love the setting. I love the quiet.

261
00:18:47,501 --> 00:18:52,422
I love the sparsity of--
of the soundtrack.

262
00:19:00,973 --> 00:19:03,517
- Middle of June to the end of June.

263
00:19:03,600 --> 00:19:06,436
Second unit on the Juneau Icefield.

264
00:19:10,440 --> 00:19:12,359
- This was the opening of the film.

265
00:19:12,442 --> 00:19:17,030
Dog helicopter chase
and a few selected inserts.

266
00:19:21,952 --> 00:19:26,707
- I mean, it was just a blanket
of white snow forever.

267
00:19:26,790 --> 00:19:31,712
And 40 miles across was a mountain range.

268
00:19:31,795 --> 00:19:34,423
And I swear to God to you,
it looked like it was 100 yards.

269
00:19:38,218 --> 00:19:41,722
How I got into the shot was just
because of the nature

270
00:19:41,805 --> 00:19:44,766
of the fact that we could only have
12 people in the camp.

271
00:19:46,101 --> 00:19:49,062
Oh, I had done some acting work,
but not acting,

272
00:19:49,146 --> 00:19:53,108
but John figured I could do it.
And I figured I could do it.

273
00:19:53,192 --> 00:19:55,527
I wasn't afraid to get strapped
in a helicopter.

274
00:19:55,611 --> 00:19:58,822
The only way that I'm gonna get in trouble
is if the helicopter goes down.

275
00:20:02,534 --> 00:20:07,331
One side of the uh, helicopter
was painted U.S.,

276
00:20:07,414 --> 00:20:10,083
and the other side was painted Norwegian.

277
00:20:10,167 --> 00:20:14,630
So when they're going one way,
it's one helicopter.

278
00:20:14,713 --> 00:20:17,382
When they're going the other way,
it's another helicopter.

279
00:20:19,384 --> 00:20:21,345
I was just strapped in, and I had a rifle,

280
00:20:21,428 --> 00:20:24,514
and-- and I was just talking gibberish,
you know?

281
00:20:24,598 --> 00:20:26,183
"What the fuck, fucksdorf, blobbity."

282
00:20:26,266 --> 00:20:27,976
I-- I wasn't saying anything.

283
00:20:28,060 --> 00:20:30,562
In fact, we didn't have any sound there,
I'm sure of it.

284
00:20:30,646 --> 00:20:33,273
So it was all ADR afterwards.

285
00:20:38,403 --> 00:20:43,158
It's such a compelling image,
and it's such a compelling mystery.

286
00:20:44,493 --> 00:20:46,370
UNITED STATES
NATIONAL SCIENCE INSTITUTE STATION 4

287
00:20:46,453 --> 00:20:50,791
By the time that dog arrives
at Outpost 31, you're hooked.

288
00:20:55,671 --> 00:20:57,381
- John and I, just because
we were friendly,

289
00:20:57,464 --> 00:21:00,050
I remember him talking about
what he was gonna do,

290
00:21:00,133 --> 00:21:02,094
and he was very excited about it.

291
00:21:03,428 --> 00:21:05,889
They started working,
and Larry came to me and said,

292
00:21:05,973 --> 00:21:07,891
"John wants to talk to you about
playing MacReady."

293
00:21:07,975 --> 00:21:09,476
And I said, "What?"

294
00:21:09,559 --> 00:21:13,313
Kurt Russell, you don't need
to really talk too much to--

295
00:21:13,397 --> 00:21:14,815
he knows what he's doing.

296
00:21:14,898 --> 00:21:17,401
"I don't know, it's this, it's that,
it's a monster movie,

297
00:21:17,484 --> 00:21:19,152
I guess, or a suspense or what--"

298
00:21:19,236 --> 00:21:22,906
He said, "No, no, no, it's--
it's-- it's a movie about paranoia."

299
00:21:22,990 --> 00:21:24,408
And that hit me like a ton of bricks.

300
00:21:24,491 --> 00:21:27,369
I said, "Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,
wait a minute.

301
00:21:27,452 --> 00:21:28,912
Oh, that's great."

302
00:21:28,996 --> 00:21:30,956
And goddammit,
John needed somebody who would

303
00:21:31,039 --> 00:21:34,543
just come in, hit his marks, say a line,
do as he was told,

304
00:21:34,626 --> 00:21:37,045
and do it full bore, all in.

305
00:21:39,673 --> 00:21:41,925
And that meant Kurt.
Thank God.

306
00:21:42,009 --> 00:21:45,595
I mean, because I think Kurt Russell
next to John is actually responsible

307
00:21:45,679 --> 00:21:48,348
for the success of the film
more than any other person, you know?

308
00:21:51,268 --> 00:21:55,939
He is, as far as I'm concerned,
a highly underrated actor.

309
00:21:56,023 --> 00:21:59,276
I mean, he's done some brilliant
performances.

310
00:22:01,111 --> 00:22:06,033
There were some long hours
and difficult moments,

311
00:22:06,116 --> 00:22:09,161
but he always had a joke.

312
00:22:09,244 --> 00:22:11,997
You know, yeah, you know,
'cause I'm like a method actor,

313
00:22:12,080 --> 00:22:15,250
and-- and Keith and I
are trained actors at Juilliard,

314
00:22:15,333 --> 00:22:18,295
and Kurt would be like uh,
"So what are you guys doing over there?

315
00:22:18,378 --> 00:22:20,881
Discussing your motivation?"

316
00:22:21,798 --> 00:22:24,593
It's incredible that even
after many viewings of the--

317
00:22:24,676 --> 00:22:27,679
of the movie, he's the one
you're looking at,

318
00:22:27,763 --> 00:22:30,891
when you should be looking at the others.
You know, I tend to--

319
00:22:30,974 --> 00:22:34,978
Because we assume as a spectator
that he's not the monster,

320
00:22:35,062 --> 00:22:36,646
because he's the guy.

321
00:22:38,857 --> 00:22:40,650
- His beard is fantastic.

322
00:22:40,734 --> 00:22:45,155
His hair is beyond--
I mean, it's wild. It's primal.

323
00:22:45,238 --> 00:22:47,074
He's-- he's like a beast himself.

324
00:22:47,157 --> 00:22:51,203
And those eyes are like chips
of blue glacial ice.

325
00:22:51,286 --> 00:22:53,830
His eyes are as frosty as the ice that

326
00:22:53,914 --> 00:22:57,042
they dig <i>The Thing</i> out of.
It's perfect casting.

327
00:23:02,297 --> 00:23:03,799
In the first scene, he's, I think,

328
00:23:03,882 --> 00:23:06,468
firmly established that
he's probably an alcoholic.

329
00:23:06,551 --> 00:23:09,262
And all these guys are up
in the hinterland,

330
00:23:09,346 --> 00:23:12,140
probably all of them
having their own personal issues.

331
00:23:12,224 --> 00:23:15,560
You wouldn't be in a situation like that
if you didn't.

332
00:23:15,644 --> 00:23:18,271
<i>Poor baby, you're starting to lose it,</i>
<i>aren't you?</i>

333
00:23:18,355 --> 00:23:20,607
MacReady is the ultimate screen badass.

334
00:23:20,690 --> 00:23:24,611
You know, Kurt Russell is the best
at playing badasses.

335
00:23:25,487 --> 00:23:28,573
Not giving a fuck. Salt of the earth.

336
00:23:28,657 --> 00:23:31,576
And he's a helicopter pilot.
He's not a scientist.

337
00:23:32,369 --> 00:23:35,622
He plays chess. He drinks his whiskey.

338
00:23:35,705 --> 00:23:40,544
And he's the guy who really understands
how to take charge of the situation.

339
00:23:57,727 --> 00:24:00,856
MacReady is very much
a Howard Hawks character.

340
00:24:00,939 --> 00:24:02,858
He's hardboiled.

341
00:24:02,941 --> 00:24:07,529
You know, you can imagine in
another epoch he might have

342
00:24:07,612 --> 00:24:09,531
been Humphrey Bogart, you know?

343
00:24:09,614 --> 00:24:11,533
He's a whiskey drinker.

344
00:24:11,616 --> 00:24:15,787
He's-- makes him reliable for some reason.

345
00:24:16,830 --> 00:24:20,417
Probably 'cause the directors
of these films were like Howard Hawks

346
00:24:20,500 --> 00:24:25,922
and John Huston
were semi-alcoholics, I think.

347
00:24:26,006 --> 00:24:27,966
They liked their characters
to drink whiskey, too,

348
00:24:28,049 --> 00:24:29,509
'cause it made them real men.

349
00:24:29,593 --> 00:24:32,220
<i>Well, I'd feel better about it</i>
<i>if you'd have a drink with me.</i>

350
00:24:33,054 --> 00:24:35,599
It's extreme that a guy
who might have to jump

351
00:24:35,682 --> 00:24:38,101
in the helicopter at any time

352
00:24:38,143 --> 00:24:42,189
would not only be drinking
but be probably half in the bag.

353
00:24:45,275 --> 00:24:47,527
Other people are panicking.
Other people are freaking out.

354
00:24:47,611 --> 00:24:50,071
He just steps in and he takes control
of the situation.

355
00:24:50,155 --> 00:24:51,781
And we, the audience, trust him.

356
00:24:53,408 --> 00:24:54,659
<i>Be there in a minute, Doc.</i>

357
00:24:55,994 --> 00:25:00,081
He's meant to be the exceptional
everyday man.

358
00:25:00,165 --> 00:25:04,669
Right? Like in any Western, it's like,
a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do.

359
00:25:04,753 --> 00:25:06,379
And that's basically the philosophy.

360
00:25:06,463 --> 00:25:10,300
And the sparse writing
of that character tells you he will.

361
00:25:25,190 --> 00:25:27,859
- Kurt Russell is to John Carpenter

362
00:25:27,943 --> 00:25:32,322
as Jean-Pierre Léaud
was to François Truffaut.

363
00:25:32,405 --> 00:25:36,201
Or Robert De Niro to Martin Scorsese.

364
00:25:36,284 --> 00:25:39,663
The French have a term for it,
is actor fetish.

365
00:25:41,623 --> 00:25:44,000
You gotta go back to <i>Elvis</i>
and <i>Escape from New York</i>

366
00:25:44,084 --> 00:25:46,711
and we just had a great time
working together.

367
00:25:46,795 --> 00:25:48,880
Just gelled ple-- completely.

368
00:25:48,964 --> 00:25:53,093
We were the right mix
for director and actor.

369
00:25:54,469 --> 00:25:59,307
- <i>The Thing</i> sort of epitomizes
Carpenter through his selection

370
00:25:59,391 --> 00:26:01,309
of MacReady as the main character.

371
00:26:01,393 --> 00:26:04,521
That type of character,
that loner character,

372
00:26:04,604 --> 00:26:06,731
the guy who doesn't want to follow
the rules,

373
00:26:06,815 --> 00:26:10,568
the guy who kind of is cynical
about the world.

374
00:26:10,652 --> 00:26:14,281
You can feel Carpenter speaking
through MacReady.

375
00:26:15,991 --> 00:26:19,536
I don't know what Bill Lancaster
and-- and John did in terms

376
00:26:19,619 --> 00:26:22,247
of writing together, working on it.

377
00:26:22,330 --> 00:26:24,708
Just naturally, John might have had some

378
00:26:24,791 --> 00:26:29,212
alter-ego feelings about
some of the characters that I played.

379
00:26:30,422 --> 00:26:34,801
I think for MacReady it was more
a combination of common sense

380
00:26:34,884 --> 00:26:38,096
mixed with,
"What the hell is this exactly?

381
00:26:38,179 --> 00:26:41,266
What am I looking at here?
I have a problem.

382
00:26:41,349 --> 00:26:43,768
How can I break this down?
Figure this out."

383
00:26:55,238 --> 00:26:57,574
Is there anything with the Norwegians
that they're saying?

384
00:26:57,657 --> 00:26:59,200
[speaks Norwegian]

385
00:27:02,329 --> 00:27:05,373
Can we translate Norwegian to hear
what they're screaming?

386
00:27:05,457 --> 00:27:06,916
If there's another clue there.

387
00:27:08,501 --> 00:27:10,879
<i>Se til helvete og kom dere vekk.</i>
<i>Get the hell out of here.</i>

388
00:27:18,470 --> 00:27:20,930
It's like, "Oh man.
They could have saved the whole thing."

389
00:27:25,435 --> 00:27:28,271
I had to work with for two weeks
with the dogs,

390
00:27:28,355 --> 00:27:31,858
so I could stand there
and accept the dog jumping on me

391
00:27:31,941 --> 00:27:35,695
without freaking out,
because I was bit badly as a child.

392
00:27:35,779 --> 00:27:37,655
[speaks Norwegian]

393
00:27:40,533 --> 00:27:42,952
- I was infected at that time.
But I didn't know it.

394
00:27:43,036 --> 00:27:46,915
And I didn't know it as a--
as a person in the movie.

395
00:27:46,998 --> 00:27:49,542
And I didn't know it
as the actor right away.

396
00:27:50,835 --> 00:27:54,255
I probably was the first one
to be infected.

397
00:27:55,173 --> 00:27:56,841
<i>-George, are you okay?</i>
<i>-Yeah, yeah, I'm okay.</i>

398
00:27:56,925 --> 00:27:58,802
<i>-Are you? -Yeah. What's going on there?</i>

399
00:27:58,885 --> 00:28:00,428
It was all very murky.

400
00:28:03,098 --> 00:28:08,228
You know, you have a little western town
and suddenly um, bad guys come in.

401
00:28:08,311 --> 00:28:10,688
Like the way Garry…

402
00:28:10,772 --> 00:28:13,525
The moment he sees Lars,
the Norwegian, coming,

403
00:28:13,608 --> 00:28:16,528
he's not stepping through the door,
opens the door and shoots him.

404
00:28:16,611 --> 00:28:18,780
He smashes the window.

405
00:28:21,032 --> 00:28:24,994
So that's like a western, you know,
it was like a western sheriff to me.

406
00:28:32,085 --> 00:28:34,045
<i>First goddamn week of winter.</i>

407
00:28:44,931 --> 00:28:48,184
Look, I haven't been able to reach shit
in two weeks.

408
00:28:48,268 --> 00:28:49,853
<i>I doubt if anybody's talked to anybody</i>

409
00:28:49,936 --> 00:28:53,398
<i>on this entire continent</i>
<i>and you want me to reach somebody.</i>

410
00:29:07,495 --> 00:29:10,206
When we were doing the production design

411
00:29:10,290 --> 00:29:14,127
but with John Lloyd,
he's a tremendous production designer,

412
00:29:14,210 --> 00:29:17,005
so we talked about this being
a kind of um,

413
00:29:17,088 --> 00:29:20,842
a government installation. Green walls.

414
00:29:20,925 --> 00:29:24,596
We had to repaint them,
because Dean came up to me and said,

415
00:29:24,679 --> 00:29:27,557
"Green is not a color that's nice."

416
00:29:29,642 --> 00:29:33,229
About a week before production began,
on the large stage set 27

417
00:29:33,313 --> 00:29:35,565
you know, the compound,
the hallways, rec room

418
00:29:35,648 --> 00:29:38,193
and everything else,
in a rare miscommunication

419
00:29:38,276 --> 00:29:41,404
by John Lloyd, that set had been painted

420
00:29:41,488 --> 00:29:45,783
a little lighter color, a lighter pale,
almost hospital green.

421
00:29:45,867 --> 00:29:48,495
John came down,
not dressed yet to look at it,

422
00:29:48,578 --> 00:29:50,872
and completely flipped out.

423
00:29:50,955 --> 00:29:53,124
I mean, I've never seen John this angry.

424
00:29:53,208 --> 00:29:57,420
Within an hour, John Lloyd came down
and we painted a wall, a test wall,

425
00:29:57,504 --> 00:30:02,175
that colder steel blue gray quality
that you see now in the set.

426
00:30:02,258 --> 00:30:04,260
And you spend a lot of time
in this movie staring

427
00:30:04,344 --> 00:30:08,056
at those walls as they slowly come in
and it makes a big, big difference.

428
00:30:08,139 --> 00:30:09,432
It's not a subtle change.

429
00:30:09,516 --> 00:30:13,811
<i>U.S. Number 31 calling McMurdo.</i>
<i>Come in. Over.</i>

430
00:30:13,895 --> 00:30:18,358
The film really had to look real,
contemporary,

431
00:30:18,441 --> 00:30:22,987
as opposed to a stylized
science fiction um, film.

432
00:30:23,071 --> 00:30:27,450
<i>What were they doing flying that low,</i>
<i>shooting at a dog, at us?</i>

433
00:30:27,534 --> 00:30:30,578
- We never moved the walls of the set.

434
00:30:30,662 --> 00:30:35,083
We shot with the camera
as if we were in a real,

435
00:30:35,166 --> 00:30:36,376
you know, environment.

436
00:30:37,627 --> 00:30:42,173
- My two favorite words,
especially in sci-fi, "What if?"

437
00:30:42,257 --> 00:30:45,593
You know, in this case,
it was being presented as very, very real.

438
00:30:49,013 --> 00:30:51,849
It looks like the kind of town
that might spring up around,

439
00:30:51,933 --> 00:30:53,476
you know, a gold mine or something.

440
00:30:53,560 --> 00:30:57,021
It's a bunch of guys
who look a little rough and tumble,

441
00:30:57,105 --> 00:31:00,024
even though some of them might not be, um,
but they're-- they're bearded.

442
00:31:00,108 --> 00:31:02,735
There's-- there's-- there's whiskey
in their hands at all times.

443
00:31:02,819 --> 00:31:05,029
This is-- this is very much--

444
00:31:05,113 --> 00:31:06,447
I mean, it's literally a frontier town

445
00:31:06,531 --> 00:31:09,826
because what is the South Pole
if not a frontier of some kind, right?

446
00:31:10,451 --> 00:31:15,456
<i>I was wondering when El Capitan</i>
<i>was gonna get a chance to use his popgun.</i>

447
00:31:16,708 --> 00:31:20,295
Let's say this was a job listing
somewhere, right?

448
00:31:20,378 --> 00:31:24,632
They all decided it was okay
to leave society and go be

449
00:31:24,716 --> 00:31:25,967
at the end of the Earth.

450
00:31:26,926 --> 00:31:30,680
The other kind of person that does that
is the serial killers. Frankly.

451
00:31:32,056 --> 00:31:33,391
<i>You reach anybody yet?</i>

452
00:31:33,474 --> 00:31:38,396
- Some of the scientists get a pass
because it's their scientific world.

453
00:31:38,479 --> 00:31:41,733
But a lot of those guys, you j--
it's like they just don't want

454
00:31:41,858 --> 00:31:44,360
to be a part of society
or they need to be removed

455
00:31:44,444 --> 00:31:47,280
from society or they need to be away
from society.

456
00:31:48,406 --> 00:31:51,242
You never questioned these bunch of men.

457
00:31:51,326 --> 00:31:53,494
Like, what are-- are they researching?

458
00:31:53,578 --> 00:31:55,747
US ANTARCTICA
RESEARCH PROGRAM

459
00:31:55,830 --> 00:32:00,960
The idea of isolating
a small group of people

460
00:32:01,044 --> 00:32:04,964
in an enclosed environment
and just watching what happens,

461
00:32:05,048 --> 00:32:09,719
it's very-- it's very like
a scientist observing lab rats.

462
00:32:09,802 --> 00:32:12,055
<i>- How long have they been stationed there?</i>

463
00:32:12,138 --> 00:32:13,306
<i>It says here only eight weeks.</i>

464
00:32:13,389 --> 00:32:15,016
<i>- Well, that's not long enough for guys</i>
<i>to go bonkers.</i>

465
00:32:15,099 --> 00:32:17,477
<i>Bullshit, bwana. Five minutes is enough</i>

466
00:32:17,560 --> 00:32:20,104
<i>-to put a man over down here.</i>
<i>- Damn straight.</i>

467
00:32:20,188 --> 00:32:25,526
If you look at the, the script,
it really-- it's like a-- it's a play.

468
00:32:25,610 --> 00:32:28,321
It takes place in basically one room

469
00:32:28,404 --> 00:32:31,866
and there's an ensemble of men,
like <i>12 Angry Men</i> or something.

470
00:32:31,949 --> 00:32:35,745
<i>I can't see two slaps in the face</i>
<i>provoking him into committing murder.</i>

471
00:32:35,828 --> 00:32:39,457
<i>It may have been two too many.</i>
<i>Everyone has a breaking point.</i>

472
00:32:39,540 --> 00:32:44,003
One of the things that I think
is really indelible about

473
00:32:44,087 --> 00:32:47,924
<i>The Thing</i> is the cast of characters.

474
00:32:48,007 --> 00:32:52,011
You recognize them the moment
they walk on screen,

475
00:32:52,095 --> 00:32:55,390
not necessarily just their physicality,
but their character.

476
00:32:55,473 --> 00:33:00,144
Everybody has their own sort of agenda
and perceptions

477
00:33:00,228 --> 00:33:04,440
of this world, and you know,
we're meeting them after

478
00:33:04,524 --> 00:33:06,359
they've already been there
for quite some time. By--

479
00:33:06,442 --> 00:33:10,279
Like when we meet them,
there's a sense that they were

480
00:33:10,363 --> 00:33:12,740
pretty stressed before this happened.

481
00:33:12,824 --> 00:33:17,495
Right? Had the alien not landed,
something else might have gone wrong.

482
00:33:19,455 --> 00:33:22,166
- There were a lot of characters
in the novella.

483
00:33:22,250 --> 00:33:24,794
There were too many characters
for a movie, I thought.

484
00:33:24,877 --> 00:33:29,465
So what we did was we cut it back
to a reasonable number.

485
00:33:30,883 --> 00:33:32,885
- When submitting the script to actors,

486
00:33:32,969 --> 00:33:35,054
we would let them know,
and their agents know,

487
00:33:35,138 --> 00:33:38,349
that we were-- this wasn't just another
science-fiction film.

488
00:33:38,433 --> 00:33:40,643
The pretentious phrase that
I used with the agents was,

489
00:33:40,727 --> 00:33:43,104
we were treating this like
an Elia Kazan film.

490
00:33:46,315 --> 00:33:48,025
John, he comes in with a list.

491
00:33:48,109 --> 00:33:50,194
And he said,
"This is who I want for this movie."

492
00:33:50,278 --> 00:33:53,448
And he starts reading the list.
And the list is as follows.

493
00:33:54,532 --> 00:33:58,828
For MacReady, Tom Atkins.
For Blair, Donald Pleasence.

494
00:33:58,911 --> 00:34:04,041
For Childs, Isaac Hayes.
For Norris, Charles Cyphers.

495
00:34:04,125 --> 00:34:05,334
<i>You know, it's Halloween.</i>

496
00:34:05,418 --> 00:34:07,628
<i>I guess everyone's entitled</i>
<i>to one good scare, huh?</i>

497
00:34:08,296 --> 00:34:11,924
You're beginning to get the picture.
It was John's stock company.

498
00:34:12,008 --> 00:34:13,009
I went to John.

499
00:34:14,135 --> 00:34:16,262
And I said,
"I think you're making a mistake.

500
00:34:16,345 --> 00:34:20,600
You have for the first time the money
and the chance,

501
00:34:20,683 --> 00:34:22,769
you know, to go after, you know,

502
00:34:22,852 --> 00:34:24,812
whoever it is you really want
to go after."

503
00:34:32,904 --> 00:34:34,739
<i>How many in their party?</i>

504
00:34:34,822 --> 00:34:37,366
<i>We started with 10.</i>
<i>There'd be eight others left.</i>

505
00:34:37,450 --> 00:34:38,951
<i>How do we know?</i>

506
00:34:39,035 --> 00:34:41,078
<i>Guys as crazy as that could</i>
<i>have done a lot of damage</i>

507
00:34:41,162 --> 00:34:42,789
<i>to their own before they got to us.</i>

508
00:34:42,872 --> 00:34:44,582
The film was greenlit six months,
you know,

509
00:34:44,665 --> 00:34:46,083
before John actually came aboard.

510
00:34:46,167 --> 00:34:49,962
And during that time,
Universal's casting department,

511
00:34:50,046 --> 00:34:52,507
explored a few front-rank options.

512
00:34:52,590 --> 00:34:56,094
Would Clint Eastwood be available?
Harrison Ford?

513
00:34:56,177 --> 00:34:59,555
We liked a lot of actors
who came in to meet,

514
00:34:59,639 --> 00:35:03,226
like Ed Harris or Scott Glenn.
They all passed.

515
00:35:03,309 --> 00:35:05,937
Reason usually was they didn't

516
00:35:06,020 --> 00:35:08,397
want to play second fiddle to a monster.

517
00:35:08,481 --> 00:35:12,902
Jack Thompson was suggested
by his agent to play MacReady.

518
00:35:12,985 --> 00:35:15,321
This is right after Thompson
had won the uh,

519
00:35:15,404 --> 00:35:18,699
the Best Actor award for <i>Breaker Morant</i>
at the Cannes Film Festival.

520
00:35:19,742 --> 00:35:22,703
The only actor I can remember
who could carry a film,

521
00:35:22,787 --> 00:35:25,706
who was interested in doing it
at the time, was Sam Shepard.

522
00:35:25,790 --> 00:35:27,834
He'd read the script and liked it.

523
00:35:27,917 --> 00:35:30,920
The studio asked John
to consider Kevin Kline.

524
00:35:31,003 --> 00:35:34,048
They thought he was something,
offered a little bit

525
00:35:34,132 --> 00:35:35,466
in terms of box office.

526
00:35:35,550 --> 00:35:38,761
<i>I just cannot believe</i>
<i>any of this voodoo bullshit.</i>

527
00:35:38,803 --> 00:35:44,475
- Childs. We considered Frank McRae,
Ernie Hudson, Isaac Hayes.

528
00:35:45,351 --> 00:35:47,937
<i>Oh, shit.</i>

529
00:35:48,020 --> 00:35:52,108
Tom's backup for the role,
as we out in New York, was Brad Dourif.

530
00:35:52,191 --> 00:35:55,611
He and Brad were always up for the same
roles, you know, at that time.

531
00:35:55,695 --> 00:35:59,699
<i>MacReady, I know Bennings. I've known him</i>
<i>for 10 years. He's my friend.</i>

532
00:35:59,782 --> 00:36:03,786
- For Garry, we thought
of Kenneth McMillan, Kevin Conway.

533
00:36:03,870 --> 00:36:06,497
An interesting idea was Richard Mulligan.

534
00:36:06,581 --> 00:36:08,332
Lee Van Cleef was a thought

535
00:36:08,416 --> 00:36:11,335
of John's original
<i>Escape from New York</i> list.

536
00:36:11,419 --> 00:36:16,507
We had also thought about playing Garry
as a contemporary of MacReady's.

537
00:36:16,591 --> 00:36:19,176
Wonder if there was any dramatic mileage
to be had doing that.

538
00:36:19,260 --> 00:36:21,345
And for that, we thought of Powers Boothe.

539
00:36:22,471 --> 00:36:27,059
<i>Oh, come on. Four stitches.</i>
<i>Barely grazed you.</i>

540
00:36:27,143 --> 00:36:29,437
- Copper. John wanted Richard Dysart.

541
00:36:29,520 --> 00:36:33,024
I favored Brian Dennehy.
And John loved Dennehy, too.

542
00:36:33,107 --> 00:36:34,775
He originally came in for MacReady.

543
00:36:34,859 --> 00:36:37,028
He was gonna be a backup
for Wilford Brimley,

544
00:36:37,111 --> 00:36:39,864
or Blair had will not signed on.

545
00:36:39,947 --> 00:36:42,992
Right about this time,
Roy Arbogast comes to my office,

546
00:36:43,075 --> 00:36:46,370
the mechanical special effects
foreman, and says,

547
00:36:46,454 --> 00:36:49,248
"I'm gonna quit."
"You're going to quit, Roy?

548
00:36:49,332 --> 00:36:51,375
Why-- why-- why are you going to quit?"

549
00:36:51,459 --> 00:36:55,671
"Rob Bottin has told me
that John Carpenter has asked him

550
00:36:55,755 --> 00:36:56,797
to play Palmer.

551
00:36:58,341 --> 00:37:00,885
And I'm telling you that
if he plays Palmer,

552
00:37:00,968 --> 00:37:05,473
he's not gonna be doing any effects work,
and I'm not gonna take up the slack."

553
00:37:06,307 --> 00:37:11,938
I go to John. And I say uh,
"Did you ask Rob to play Palmer?"

554
00:37:12,021 --> 00:37:14,315
And John says, "No, no, no, no, no.

555
00:37:14,398 --> 00:37:16,359
Rob asked me if he could play Palmer."

556
00:37:17,777 --> 00:37:19,320
And I said, "Well, you didn't say no?"

557
00:37:19,403 --> 00:37:21,697
And he said,
"Well, I said I'd think about it."

558
00:37:28,871 --> 00:37:30,539
Casting is an interesting thing.

559
00:37:30,623 --> 00:37:32,583
And I think one of the things
that's really interesting

560
00:37:32,667 --> 00:37:38,089
about that movie is for me, for my money,
I think John cast it perfectly.

561
00:37:40,132 --> 00:37:44,095
First of all, he hired probably
the best actors.

562
00:37:44,887 --> 00:37:47,682
I mean, it sounds like I'm bragging.

563
00:37:47,765 --> 00:37:51,102
I don't mean me. Uh, you know, I'm good.

564
00:37:51,185 --> 00:37:54,605
But he got Wilford Brimley.
He got Donald Moffat.

565
00:37:54,689 --> 00:37:58,859
He got Dick Dysart.
He got Charlie Hallahan.

566
00:37:58,943 --> 00:38:03,531
And by sheer talent,
he pulled together a group of people.

567
00:38:03,614 --> 00:38:07,326
Joel Polis. I mean, Richard Masur.

568
00:38:07,410 --> 00:38:10,830
The chemistry, it was palpable.

569
00:38:10,913 --> 00:38:13,165
<i>-I have to talk to you.</i>
<i>-I'm tired of talking, Fuchs.</i>

570
00:38:13,249 --> 00:38:15,001
<i>I just want to get up to my shack</i>
<i>and get drunk.</i>

571
00:38:15,084 --> 00:38:18,462
Each of those actors, from Wilford Brimley

572
00:38:18,546 --> 00:38:21,841
to Kurt Russell, they are notes

573
00:38:21,924 --> 00:38:24,301
- and they are an American symphony.
-Yeah.

574
00:38:24,385 --> 00:38:29,056
It's most every type of person
that is in America.

575
00:38:29,140 --> 00:38:31,350
And that's why I think it's very profound,
the movie.

576
00:38:31,434 --> 00:38:32,977
<i>Now how does this motherfucker</i>
<i>wake up after thousands</i>

577
00:38:33,060 --> 00:38:34,228
<i>of years in the ice?</i>

578
00:38:34,311 --> 00:38:35,771
<i>And how can it look like a dog?</i>

579
00:38:35,855 --> 00:38:36,856
<i>- I don't know how.</i>

580
00:38:36,939 --> 00:38:37,982
They're brilliant.

581
00:38:38,065 --> 00:38:41,068
They made the movie,
'cause of their humanity.

582
00:38:42,653 --> 00:38:45,364
- John gave us the gift
of two weeks' rehearsal,

583
00:38:45,448 --> 00:38:48,034
and he had to fight for that,
but he did fight for it.

584
00:38:48,117 --> 00:38:53,039
And we just sat around the table,
no props, no nothing.

585
00:38:53,873 --> 00:38:57,710
Um, and we read this-- read through
the script repeatedly,

586
00:38:57,793 --> 00:39:01,088
but we also talked a lot. A lot.

587
00:39:01,172 --> 00:39:03,841
We talked about premise,
and we talked about, you know,

588
00:39:03,924 --> 00:39:06,844
character development
and plot development.

589
00:39:08,554 --> 00:39:10,139
At one point, I wrote a note.

590
00:39:10,222 --> 00:39:13,476
There's a blackboard, a piece of chalk,
and a big table,

591
00:39:13,559 --> 00:39:15,227
and some chairs. That's all.

592
00:39:15,311 --> 00:39:19,356
And I wrote on the board once,
"You don't need a weatherman

593
00:39:19,440 --> 00:39:21,984
to know which way the wind blows."

594
00:39:22,068 --> 00:39:24,570
<i>♪ The wind blows ♪</i>

595
00:39:24,653 --> 00:39:27,531
Every time you solve one issue,
then something else comes up.

596
00:39:27,615 --> 00:39:31,577
And then, so, you know, so
we're constantly making these adjustments.

597
00:39:31,660 --> 00:39:34,205
[overlapping speech]

598
00:39:34,288 --> 00:39:36,499
- Keith and I were the two big guys.

599
00:39:36,582 --> 00:39:42,213
We struck sparks off each other
right away in reading stuff.

600
00:39:42,296 --> 00:39:46,842
And we started like, staring
each other down around the table.

601
00:39:46,926 --> 00:39:52,306
Not personally, but a little bit
personally. You know?

602
00:39:52,389 --> 00:39:55,226
And there's stuff like,
where I pull the knife on him

603
00:39:55,309 --> 00:39:57,770
when he reaches for the gun
and everything.

604
00:40:00,272 --> 00:40:03,776
That-- we totally invented that.
That was not in there at all.

605
00:40:03,859 --> 00:40:08,197
I was very aware of the fact
that John and I were in cahoots.

606
00:40:08,280 --> 00:40:10,699
And we'd done two movies together.

607
00:40:10,783 --> 00:40:13,035
And while that's great,
but it can make the--

608
00:40:13,119 --> 00:40:15,663
you have to be careful,
it can make the other actors feel like,

609
00:40:15,746 --> 00:40:18,290
"Hang on a second here." You know?

610
00:40:18,374 --> 00:40:20,084
I know you guys, you know,

611
00:40:20,167 --> 00:40:24,088
but we never worked together here,
so part of my thing

612
00:40:24,171 --> 00:40:28,217
as a part of that crew
was to try to make sure

613
00:40:28,300 --> 00:40:30,678
that didn't get out of hand in any way.

614
00:40:30,761 --> 00:40:33,597
And finally, after two weeks, John said,
"Okay, look, fellas.

615
00:40:33,681 --> 00:40:36,934
This is it.
This is the script we're shooting.

616
00:40:37,017 --> 00:40:38,519
This is what we're gonna do."

617
00:40:38,602 --> 00:40:41,480
<i>I ain't going with him.</i>
<i>I'll go with Childs.</i>

618
00:40:41,564 --> 00:40:43,816
<i>-Hey, fuck you, Palmer!</i>
<i>-I ain't going with you!</i>

619
00:40:43,899 --> 00:40:50,698
I don't remember feeling any tension
between myself

620
00:40:50,781 --> 00:40:53,492
and other-- other actors.

621
00:40:53,576 --> 00:40:55,619
I may have repressed that,
but on the other hand,

622
00:40:55,703 --> 00:41:00,499
I wouldn't say we were a band of brothers,
because we weren't.

623
00:41:01,542 --> 00:41:05,045
It was a film about a bunch of guys
stranded in this place

624
00:41:05,129 --> 00:41:07,506
and this weird thing happens to them.

625
00:41:07,590 --> 00:41:11,635
And we-- we all went at it
very realistically.

626
00:41:12,845 --> 00:41:15,973
That female energy is missing,

627
00:41:16,056 --> 00:41:20,436
which adds to a much more
oppressive environment.

628
00:41:22,438 --> 00:41:24,523
- Much has been said,
which is fascinating,

629
00:41:24,607 --> 00:41:28,652
that the single female voice
in the entire movie is

630
00:41:28,736 --> 00:41:31,238
at the very beginning. It's a machine.

631
00:41:31,322 --> 00:41:34,325
<i>- Checkmate. Checkmate.</i>

632
00:41:34,408 --> 00:41:35,868
And it's silenced immediately.

633
00:41:35,951 --> 00:41:37,453
You know, it's the computer playing chess

634
00:41:37,536 --> 00:41:42,082
and it's, "Shut up, bitch.
This is gonna be about men."

635
00:41:44,126 --> 00:41:45,794
<i>Cheating bitch.</i>

636
00:41:47,504 --> 00:41:50,174
- That's my wife at the time, Adrienne.

637
00:41:50,257 --> 00:41:52,218
Yeah. Oh, yeah.

638
00:41:52,301 --> 00:41:53,969
That was just probably pillow talk.

639
00:41:54,053 --> 00:41:55,763
"Hey, can you come do this?", you know?

640
00:41:57,473 --> 00:42:01,101
- It's very much fueled
by the power of these men.

641
00:42:01,185 --> 00:42:04,480
And it is a competition
of who is the alpha male.

642
00:42:04,563 --> 00:42:07,983
And survival depends on it to a degree.

643
00:42:08,067 --> 00:42:14,406
And the two most dominant men in the pack
are the ones

644
00:42:14,490 --> 00:42:16,200
that survive at the end.

645
00:42:18,035 --> 00:42:21,580
- There was also images of women
all over the-- the camp.

646
00:42:21,664 --> 00:42:24,750
When they watch a game show,
there are clearly women in that.

647
00:42:24,833 --> 00:42:29,880
There's a cut scene where Kurt Russell's
getting around with a blow-up doll.

648
00:42:29,964 --> 00:42:32,758
There was clearly an idea that
they had to reference that

649
00:42:32,841 --> 00:42:34,510
there aren't any women there.

650
00:42:35,928 --> 00:42:39,723
I did formulate a theory at one time
that <i>The Thing</i> was

651
00:42:39,807 --> 00:42:44,144
kind of like the only female cast member
and this is possibly

652
00:42:44,228 --> 00:42:46,438
why they're all so afraid of it.

653
00:42:46,522 --> 00:42:50,401
It was very much into body changing,
body horror.

654
00:42:50,484 --> 00:42:53,404
The idea of-- of men being invaded by this

655
00:42:53,487 --> 00:42:58,534
sort of female Id type creature
just sort of adds

656
00:42:58,617 --> 00:43:00,160
to the horror in a way.

657
00:43:00,244 --> 00:43:05,040
That's fascinating! I never thought of it.

658
00:43:05,124 --> 00:43:06,166
Oh my God.

659
00:43:06,250 --> 00:43:08,544
That-- you completely blew my brain
right now.

660
00:43:10,254 --> 00:43:12,715
I'm sure John would hate this,
but the fear

661
00:43:12,798 --> 00:43:16,719
of something female hiding inside a man

662
00:43:16,802 --> 00:43:20,264
to the degree that we have to destroy it
and burn it,

663
00:43:20,347 --> 00:43:23,225
that is a really fascinating read.
I love it.

664
00:43:26,770 --> 00:43:29,148
- They don't talk about women.

665
00:43:29,231 --> 00:43:31,317
They don't talk about their past.

666
00:43:31,400 --> 00:43:34,111
There is not enough time to do that.

667
00:43:34,194 --> 00:43:36,322
So backstories aren't told.

668
00:43:36,405 --> 00:43:39,867
It engages you as a viewer
to not bog the viewer down

669
00:43:39,950 --> 00:43:43,162
with backstory or handhold them
and feed them every little bit

670
00:43:43,245 --> 00:43:44,163
of info you need.

671
00:43:44,246 --> 00:43:47,249
Instead of becoming passive,
the viewer becomes active.

672
00:43:47,333 --> 00:43:50,127
You-- you're engaged in the dilemma
of these people.

673
00:43:50,210 --> 00:43:52,588
You want to know more
and you're paying attention.

674
00:43:52,671 --> 00:43:57,259
<i>- Garry, a 30-year army man who worked up</i>
<i>through the ranks to become an officer.</i>

675
00:43:57,343 --> 00:43:58,969
- When they released the TV version,

676
00:43:59,053 --> 00:44:01,513
because it's all body horror,
and they weren't going

677
00:44:01,597 --> 00:44:03,724
to let any of that get onto the TV screen,

678
00:44:03,807 --> 00:44:06,935
so they so heavily edited the film,

679
00:44:07,019 --> 00:44:09,563
they had to go back and kind of
start throwing in scenes

680
00:44:09,646 --> 00:44:10,731
that had been cut out.

681
00:44:14,777 --> 00:44:15,861
<i>Clark?</i>

682
00:44:17,988 --> 00:44:20,240
And the weirdest thing you get
is the voiceover.

683
00:44:20,324 --> 00:44:22,284
<i>- MacReady, a top helicopter pilot,</i>

684
00:44:22,368 --> 00:44:25,120
<i>worked for Hughes Aircraft</i>
<i>as a test pilot until he got</i>

685
00:44:25,204 --> 00:44:27,748
<i>into a confrontation with top management</i>
<i>and resigned</i>

686
00:44:27,831 --> 00:44:28,957
<i>to take this assignment.</i>

687
00:44:29,041 --> 00:44:31,627
It's kind of ruining the whole mystery
of the film

688
00:44:31,710 --> 00:44:34,797
by blatantly telling you
what everyone does

689
00:44:34,880 --> 00:44:36,131
and why they're there.

690
00:44:36,215 --> 00:44:38,509
<i>- Palmer, second string chopper pilot,</i>

691
00:44:38,592 --> 00:44:40,969
<i>crack mechanic who hopes</i>
<i>to start up his own business</i>

692
00:44:41,053 --> 00:44:43,597
<i>as a mechanic, upon completion</i>
<i>of this assignment.</i>

693
00:44:44,807 --> 00:44:48,018
- John, I'm not really sure

694
00:44:48,102 --> 00:44:51,814
how important it is to him

695
00:44:51,897 --> 00:44:56,777
to understand the characters
psychologically,

696
00:44:56,819 --> 00:44:58,529
what's going through their minds,

697
00:44:58,612 --> 00:45:03,158
what is their mental state
or even spiritual state.

698
00:45:03,242 --> 00:45:06,620
Hell no. That's too hard.

699
00:45:06,703 --> 00:45:08,747
That's too much trouble. I let them do it.

700
00:45:09,164 --> 00:45:10,833
<i>Mac, it may not clear up for a week.</i>

701
00:45:10,916 --> 00:45:12,418
<i>-Yeah. -And we're the closest ones to 'em.</i>

702
00:45:12,501 --> 00:45:14,128
<i>It's all right by me, Doc.</i>
<i>I'm just letting you know.</i>

703
00:45:14,211 --> 00:45:17,923
I remember Richard Dysart said
he was a Russian spy.

704
00:45:18,006 --> 00:45:21,385
But none of that stuff's on the screen,
so that's fine.

705
00:45:24,221 --> 00:45:25,431
<i>It's up to you, Mac.</i>

706
00:45:25,514 --> 00:45:27,141
<i>If you don't want to fly, we don't fly.</i>

707
00:46:00,424 --> 00:46:02,426
<i>Nauls, will you turn that crap down?</i>

708
00:46:02,509 --> 00:46:05,554
<i>I'm trying to get some sleep.</i>
<i>I was shot today.</i>

709
00:46:05,637 --> 00:46:12,144
Peter Maloney was the right guy
to play Bennings, I think.

710
00:46:12,227 --> 00:46:14,563
And that's not necessarily a compliment.

711
00:46:16,356 --> 00:46:18,108
- He's not a very sympathetic character,

712
00:46:18,192 --> 00:46:21,195
but I think also he's another one
who's out of his depth

713
00:46:21,278 --> 00:46:24,072
as part of the genius of the casting.

714
00:46:24,156 --> 00:46:28,160
Most of these guys belong in an office,
not in an outpost

715
00:46:28,243 --> 00:46:29,578
in the middle of Antarctica.

716
00:46:31,538 --> 00:46:37,711
All these actors put their characters
across so quickly, so economically.

717
00:46:37,794 --> 00:46:41,715
He gets shot in the leg,
and then he starts whinging about it.

718
00:46:43,967 --> 00:46:46,929
He was just a nice man. Peter was sweet.

719
00:46:47,012 --> 00:46:51,225
Peter was another fun person to talk--
kind of soft-spoken.

720
00:46:51,308 --> 00:46:53,769
<i>Clark, will you put this mutt</i>
<i>with the others where he belongs?</i>

721
00:46:53,852 --> 00:46:57,564
I got a call to audition for this movie.

722
00:46:58,774 --> 00:47:02,528
And so I went up to the Coca-Cola building
on Fifth Avenue.

723
00:47:02,611 --> 00:47:06,365
And into these chambers,
I think it was a boardroom.

724
00:47:06,448 --> 00:47:09,409
As far as I remember,
there was no script at this point.

725
00:47:09,493 --> 00:47:10,536
John was there.

726
00:47:10,619 --> 00:47:13,163
A group of us were taken in
at the same time.

727
00:47:13,247 --> 00:47:19,670
An outline for a scenario
to be improvised was laid out.

728
00:47:20,504 --> 00:47:24,258
And then we did it.
We actually had a battle in the room.

729
00:47:24,341 --> 00:47:28,679
We knocked over the table.
We knocked over the chairs.

730
00:47:28,762 --> 00:47:31,598
We threw things around.
It was really wild.

731
00:47:31,682 --> 00:47:35,769
And we were inspired by wanting
to get the job.

732
00:47:35,852 --> 00:47:39,773
There was never any offer
other than Bennings to me.

733
00:47:39,856 --> 00:47:41,441
So I was a weatherman.

734
00:47:41,525 --> 00:47:45,654
Environment. Weather. Very important.

735
00:47:45,737 --> 00:47:47,781
<i>-Bennings? -Winds are gonna let up a tad</i>

736
00:47:47,864 --> 00:47:48,824
<i>next couple of hours.</i>

737
00:47:48,907 --> 00:47:50,325
<i>A tad?</i>

738
00:47:50,409 --> 00:47:52,828
Telling people about the wind
that's coming up

739
00:47:52,911 --> 00:47:55,581
and maybe you shouldn't take off
in that helicopter.

740
00:47:57,916 --> 00:48:00,752
So you're a scientific outpost
and you need some scientists there.

741
00:48:00,836 --> 00:48:03,297
Clearly the creature itself sees them
as a problem,

742
00:48:03,380 --> 00:48:06,258
'cause who does he start looking--
uh, going after first?

743
00:48:06,341 --> 00:48:08,343
He starts going after the scientists.

744
00:48:08,427 --> 00:48:10,470
The people that are gonna uncover him.

745
00:48:14,766 --> 00:48:17,352
<i>♪ Let the darkness fall ♪</i>

746
00:48:19,938 --> 00:48:25,861
I think one of the signature things on
<i>Halloween</i> was the use of the Steadicam

747
00:48:25,944 --> 00:48:30,115
to uh, continuously move the audience
through the environment

748
00:48:30,198 --> 00:48:35,370
as if they might be Michael Myers,
keeping it suspenseful.

749
00:48:39,541 --> 00:48:42,419
And the success of that
gave us the idea that

750
00:48:42,502 --> 00:48:45,631
the moving camera was something
that, you know,

751
00:48:45,714 --> 00:48:48,008
involved the audience with the story.

752
00:48:49,509 --> 00:48:51,470
Were they <i>The Thing</i>?

753
00:48:54,514 --> 00:48:57,476
But we never really completely
explained anything.

754
00:48:57,559 --> 00:49:00,437
You want the audience to become
involved personally.

755
00:49:02,981 --> 00:49:05,817
Carpenter, he knew everything he wanted

756
00:49:05,901 --> 00:49:09,696
to shoot and could actually lay in layers

757
00:49:09,780 --> 00:49:13,367
of meaning within a shot,
with a mise-en-scène of a shot,

758
00:49:13,450 --> 00:49:16,495
in ways that isn't in his earlier work.

759
00:49:19,665 --> 00:49:20,832
- And I think he was--

760
00:49:20,916 --> 00:49:23,877
It's not fair to say at his peak, because
he did a lot of great things afterwards.

761
00:49:23,960 --> 00:49:25,837
And before, but somehow as--

762
00:49:25,921 --> 00:49:27,964
I don't know, just as a visionary,
he seemed

763
00:49:28,048 --> 00:49:30,509
to be in p-- he was in peak form,
you know?

764
00:49:35,347 --> 00:49:37,974
Well, the audience knows
that the dog is different

765
00:49:38,058 --> 00:49:39,851
than an ordinary dog.

766
00:49:41,520 --> 00:49:44,523
- Clint Rowe was the dog handler,
and there were two dogs,

767
00:49:44,606 --> 00:49:47,317
but one in particular was fantastic.

768
00:49:50,237 --> 00:49:51,780
- And he was half wolf.

769
00:49:51,863 --> 00:49:55,325
A wolf doesn't necessarily growl or bark.

770
00:49:55,409 --> 00:49:59,037
A wolf looks at you,
and then he goes for you.

771
00:49:59,121 --> 00:50:00,622
And Jed had that.

772
00:50:01,873 --> 00:50:05,419
There was no emotion behind it,
but it looked exactly the same

773
00:50:05,502 --> 00:50:07,754
as when there was emotion behind it.

774
00:50:09,506 --> 00:50:13,760
When we would shoot his scenes,
we had to do a minimum crew,

775
00:50:13,844 --> 00:50:16,596
and we'd all sit around the camera
very still

776
00:50:16,680 --> 00:50:21,810
and let him come in and sniff us all,
and get used to us.

777
00:50:23,520 --> 00:50:26,106
- Clint comes in to the sound stage,

778
00:50:26,189 --> 00:50:30,902
where we're doing the table work
and he comes in with Jed, and--

779
00:50:30,986 --> 00:50:33,488
and he sits all the way over
against a wall.

780
00:50:33,572 --> 00:50:35,449
He said, "I want to bring Jed in.

781
00:50:35,532 --> 00:50:39,536
I wanted to bring him in
and introduce him to the cast."

782
00:50:39,619 --> 00:50:41,747
So I brought these guys in one at a time,

783
00:50:41,830 --> 00:50:44,791
and everybody did well
except Charlie Hallahan,

784
00:50:44,875 --> 00:50:48,336
who was terrified of him.
And he was like, shaking.

785
00:50:48,420 --> 00:50:52,716
And Jed was fine around him,
but Charlie was like, nervous as a cat.

786
00:50:52,799 --> 00:50:55,177
Clint came over,
and he handed a treat to Charlie

787
00:50:55,260 --> 00:50:57,804
and he said um, uh,
"I'm gonna have him sit

788
00:50:57,888 --> 00:51:00,015
in front of you
and then just give him the treat."

789
00:51:00,098 --> 00:51:03,101
And he went, "Jed, sit."
And Charlie went like this.

790
00:51:03,185 --> 00:51:05,228
And he threw it. And then--

791
00:51:05,312 --> 00:51:08,982
and then Jed went,
"What the-- what was that?"

792
00:51:09,983 --> 00:51:11,902
But the other one was Kurt.

793
00:51:11,985 --> 00:51:13,779
He wouldn't do anything around Kurt.

794
00:51:13,862 --> 00:51:16,531
He just kept looking at him
and backing away.

795
00:51:16,615 --> 00:51:18,450
Clint is saying to him,

796
00:51:18,533 --> 00:51:21,286
"Have you been around horses lately
or something?"

797
00:51:21,369 --> 00:51:23,288
He said uh, "Not in a while."

798
00:51:23,371 --> 00:51:25,040
He said, "What about those boots
you're wearing?

799
00:51:25,123 --> 00:51:27,083
Have-- have they been around?

800
00:51:27,167 --> 00:51:29,085
Yeah, you know, have you worn them
around horses?"

801
00:51:29,169 --> 00:51:31,797
He said, "Yeah, but I mean,
I've worn them a lot since then."

802
00:51:31,880 --> 00:51:33,965
He said, "It doesn't matter.
He doesn't like horses.

803
00:51:34,049 --> 00:51:36,718
He really doesn't like horses."

804
00:51:36,802 --> 00:51:39,471
Yeah, I kind of remember
that dog was not--

805
00:51:39,554 --> 00:51:42,057
I didn't care for him too much,
and he didn't care for me too much.

806
00:51:42,098 --> 00:51:44,810
I don't know why.
I don't know. It was like, "Eh".

807
00:51:49,898 --> 00:51:56,029
This dog came down the hallway.
He's walking towards me.

808
00:51:56,112 --> 00:51:59,741
He's looking to the right,
and he crosses lens,

809
00:51:59,825 --> 00:52:02,077
and we're tracking back with him.

810
00:52:02,994 --> 00:52:06,665
He-- once again, he crosses lens
with his eyes

811
00:52:06,748 --> 00:52:08,166
and goes in the door.

812
00:52:10,585 --> 00:52:13,880
It's unbelievable.
Humans can't do that mostly.

813
00:52:14,881 --> 00:52:17,259
And he was incredible.

814
00:52:18,802 --> 00:52:20,971
<i>♪ Writings on the wall ♪</i>

815
00:52:21,888 --> 00:52:24,391
The use of Stevie Wonder's <i>Superstition</i>

816
00:52:24,474 --> 00:52:26,726
with his line about shadow on the wall is

817
00:52:28,186 --> 00:52:32,732
incredibly on the nose, but works.

818
00:52:33,483 --> 00:52:36,611
<i>♪ Ooh, very superstitious ♪</i>

819
00:52:36,695 --> 00:52:40,031
When the dog comes into the room early,
and there-- there comes--

820
00:52:40,115 --> 00:52:42,617
there's one guy,
there's a shadow on the wall.

821
00:52:43,493 --> 00:52:45,161
That guy is not in the movie. That sha--

822
00:52:45,245 --> 00:52:47,497
If you look at that shadow,
it doesn't match anybody

823
00:52:47,581 --> 00:52:49,291
-in the movie. -Yeah, but it's a shadow.

824
00:52:49,374 --> 00:52:50,750
Oh yeah, it's just a shadow.

825
00:52:50,834 --> 00:52:52,502
The intelligence of the dog looking.

826
00:52:52,586 --> 00:52:53,753
-Yeah. Oh my-- -Astounding.

827
00:52:53,837 --> 00:52:55,297
-Yeah. -'Cause he's smart.

828
00:52:55,380 --> 00:52:59,009
It-- it was-- every time the dog looked
at anything,

829
00:52:59,092 --> 00:53:01,344
-you could see wheels turning.
-Yeah.

830
00:53:01,428 --> 00:53:06,808
It was amazing. Which suggests to me
that <i>The Thing</i> isn't just some sort

831
00:53:06,892 --> 00:53:09,352
-of instinctive organism--
-Predator, yeah, yeah.

832
00:53:09,436 --> 00:53:12,188
-But it is actually thinking.
-Yeah.

833
00:53:12,272 --> 00:53:13,857
And the dog really sells that.

834
00:53:16,484 --> 00:53:18,820
The one thing we know about
the shadow on the wall

835
00:53:18,904 --> 00:53:22,032
is that this-- the person has hair.

836
00:53:22,115 --> 00:53:26,453
So it can't be Childs.
It's kind of woolly hair.

837
00:53:26,536 --> 00:53:28,747
I think it's probably Norris.

838
00:53:28,830 --> 00:53:32,584
I think this may be the point
where Norris became infected.

839
00:53:34,002 --> 00:53:35,712
Haircut-wise and shape of the face,

840
00:53:35,795 --> 00:53:38,924
I think it has to be Palmer.
But who knows?

841
00:53:41,176 --> 00:53:43,845
- And it's always been suggested
that was Norris.

842
00:53:43,929 --> 00:53:45,347
It looks a lot like him.

843
00:53:45,430 --> 00:53:47,223
We now know it wasn't that actor at all.

844
00:53:47,307 --> 00:53:48,975
It was actually a-- a stunt double.

845
00:53:49,059 --> 00:53:51,561
He was the guy
because they didn't want a known

846
00:53:51,645 --> 00:53:53,730
physical shape to make the shadow.

847
00:53:55,398 --> 00:53:58,652
One of the fascinating things
about the journey of the movie

848
00:53:58,735 --> 00:54:02,572
is you never knew at any one given time
where it was.

849
00:54:02,656 --> 00:54:06,284
The thing I discovered is the less we know

850
00:54:06,368 --> 00:54:10,246
about the mechanism of <i>The Thing</i>,
the better off we are.

851
00:54:11,998 --> 00:54:16,252
How <i>The Thing</i> worked,
how it worked mechanically

852
00:54:16,336 --> 00:54:19,339
within the story,
how it would possess people

853
00:54:19,422 --> 00:54:22,717
and how it would move was always
a developing situation,

854
00:54:22,801 --> 00:54:25,261
even though you read the script.

855
00:54:25,345 --> 00:54:28,431
I remember um,
the <i>Invasion of the Body Snatchers</i>,

856
00:54:28,515 --> 00:54:31,893
the original, they did a really good job

857
00:54:31,977 --> 00:54:35,939
of this seed pod growing into you.

858
00:54:36,898 --> 00:54:38,942
And supposedly, when you're asleep.

859
00:54:46,658 --> 00:54:50,662
We didn't get into any of that
in <i>The Thing</i>.

860
00:54:50,745 --> 00:54:55,500
It just sort of happens off-screen,
which is, uh, I think, the best.

861
00:54:55,583 --> 00:54:58,920
As I was cutting, uh,
things were revealed to you

862
00:54:59,004 --> 00:55:02,048
and you go, "Oh, whoa, what about this?
Or what about…"

863
00:55:02,132 --> 00:55:05,593
Now, gee, you know, I didn't expect that

864
00:55:05,677 --> 00:55:06,761
it would be like this.

865
00:55:06,845 --> 00:55:10,557
It becomes its own interpretation entirely

866
00:55:10,640 --> 00:55:13,518
in the director's hands
and in the actor's hands.

867
00:55:15,311 --> 00:55:17,939
Easter egg mentality, you know,
didn't exist till we made

868
00:55:18,023 --> 00:55:19,441
the movie, you know?

869
00:55:19,524 --> 00:55:23,570
We had hoped an audience would come
once, maybe more than once,

870
00:55:23,653 --> 00:55:24,946
um, to see it, but you know,

871
00:55:25,030 --> 00:55:28,908
it was designed on a macro level,
not on a micro level.

872
00:55:30,160 --> 00:55:32,412
- Carpenter wants to give us
enough information,

873
00:55:32,495 --> 00:55:34,748
but not so much
he's spoon-feeding it to us.

874
00:55:34,831 --> 00:55:36,207
Very few directors can pull that off.

875
00:55:36,291 --> 00:55:39,794
John Carpenter, David Lynch,
Christopher Nolan.

876
00:55:41,629 --> 00:55:45,258
If you want my honest opinion,
I think John knows exactly

877
00:55:45,341 --> 00:55:48,303
who is who and who was what.

878
00:55:48,386 --> 00:55:53,641
And if you watch the movie,
you can make your own deductions.

879
00:55:55,268 --> 00:55:56,895
But it doesn't matter.

880
00:55:56,978 --> 00:55:59,606
I mean, it really doesn't--
it really doesn't matter.

881
00:56:17,832 --> 00:56:20,293
<i>My God. What the hell happened here?</i>

882
00:56:40,814 --> 00:56:44,734
- Richard Dysart as Copper,
another actor who I think would

883
00:56:44,818 --> 00:56:47,779
seem more at home in a suit in an office.

884
00:56:47,862 --> 00:56:51,407
And indeed, he was later a regular
on L.A. Law.

885
00:56:54,744 --> 00:56:55,870
<i>Anybody there?</i>

886
00:56:57,997 --> 00:56:59,207
<i>Hey, Sweden!</i>

887
00:56:59,290 --> 00:57:01,292
<i>They're not Swedish, Mac.</i>
<i>They're Norwegian.</i>

888
00:57:03,461 --> 00:57:06,214
- You know, Dysart is a really,
really accomplished actor.

889
00:57:06,297 --> 00:57:10,552
Almost classical old school type feeling
at that time. 1980.

890
00:57:10,635 --> 00:57:11,928
"Somebody got to the blood!"

891
00:57:13,012 --> 00:57:14,597
<i>Somebody got to the blood!</i>

892
00:57:14,681 --> 00:57:16,933
I just liked his whole-- his whole--

893
00:57:17,016 --> 00:57:20,937
his whole way of playing--
playing Doc, you know?

894
00:57:22,856 --> 00:57:26,192
<i>-Would that test have worked, Doc?</i>
<i>-Oh, I think so, yes.</i>

895
00:57:26,276 --> 00:57:28,570
- The detail of the nose ring.

896
00:57:28,653 --> 00:57:31,239
Nose rings in the early '80s
were not nearly

897
00:57:31,322 --> 00:57:33,241
as common as they are now.

898
00:57:33,324 --> 00:57:37,871
It's a sort of indication that,
you know, he's a bit eccentric.

899
00:57:41,166 --> 00:57:42,584
- Dysart was an old friend of mine.

900
00:57:42,667 --> 00:57:45,879
I had gotten drunk with him
on multiple occasions.

901
00:57:45,962 --> 00:57:49,132
I had smoked an incredible amount
of dope with him.

902
00:57:49,215 --> 00:57:52,886
Not nearly as much as he smoked,
'cause he smoked a lot of dope.

903
00:57:52,969 --> 00:57:57,348
But a great, great, great actor.
And Dysart had a really good run.

904
00:58:03,938 --> 00:58:09,194
Principal photography with actors
began August 24th, uh, 1981

905
00:58:09,277 --> 00:58:13,323
on stage four, at Universal,
with the Norwegian camp.

906
00:58:15,074 --> 00:58:17,619
106 degrees outside, in the midst

907
00:58:17,702 --> 00:58:21,331
of a huge summer heat wave
in the San Fernando Valley.

908
00:58:21,414 --> 00:58:26,377
38 degrees on the stage itself,
because yeah, it was refrigerated.

909
00:58:28,504 --> 00:58:30,590
Yeah, the refrigerated bits are--

910
00:58:30,673 --> 00:58:34,510
or was, in particular,
the-- the Norwegian camp.

911
00:58:34,594 --> 00:58:36,262
And we were very careful to light it,

912
00:58:36,346 --> 00:58:39,641
so you could see the-- the breath.

913
00:58:41,059 --> 00:58:43,436
Really gave a sense of authenticity.

914
00:58:48,399 --> 00:58:52,820
We all got sick on the movie,
because of the refrigeration.

915
00:58:52,904 --> 00:58:56,199
But it was mild refrigeration.
It wasn't the real thing.

916
00:58:56,282 --> 00:59:00,995
We went down to an ice house
in midtown L.A.

917
00:59:01,079 --> 00:59:02,789
to see about building a set in there.

918
00:59:02,872 --> 00:59:05,541
It was intolerably cold.

919
00:59:06,376 --> 00:59:09,420
We built uh, Hollywood refrigeration.

920
00:59:09,504 --> 00:59:11,923
Beverly Hills refrigeration, I think.

921
00:59:12,006 --> 00:59:15,510
<i>Portable video unit. Anything?</i>

922
00:59:15,593 --> 00:59:16,886
<i>It's all in Norwegian.</i>

923
00:59:18,972 --> 00:59:21,432
The entire idea of the cold
being the 13th character,

924
00:59:21,516 --> 00:59:23,393
you know, it had to always be with us.

925
00:59:23,476 --> 00:59:25,770
It wasn't enough to make it look cold.

926
00:59:25,853 --> 00:59:29,440
But as John Carpenter put it,
"How do we get it to feel cold?"

927
00:59:35,363 --> 00:59:37,532
- Cold is the character.

928
00:59:37,615 --> 00:59:42,787
Cold is what kept this secret from us.

929
00:59:42,870 --> 00:59:46,833
And then we made the mistake
of waking it up.

930
00:59:46,916 --> 00:59:51,546
And cold is what will kill us in the end,
in the movie, you know?

931
00:59:51,629 --> 00:59:55,091
It's everything that is waiting
for us outside.

932
00:59:55,174 --> 00:59:59,178
So the contrast between the hell,
and the fire,

933
00:59:59,262 --> 01:00:05,018
and the screams, and the bloody fluids
in the inside and the quiet,

934
01:00:05,101 --> 01:00:08,229
endless, eternal cold
waiting for us outside

935
01:00:08,313 --> 01:00:10,064
is what makes the movie.

936
01:00:14,777 --> 01:00:19,615
- The depiction of the Norwegian base,
which is visited by MacReady and Copper,

937
01:00:19,699 --> 01:00:22,160
trying to find out
what the hell happened there.

938
01:00:23,619 --> 01:00:25,038
It's like <i>The Snow Queen</i>.

939
01:00:25,121 --> 01:00:28,333
It's like everybody's frozen and dead.

940
01:00:28,416 --> 01:00:30,835
Like Sleeping Beauty's castle.

941
01:00:36,674 --> 01:00:40,928
That has the feel of like a,
almost like a ghost ship kind of entity.

942
01:00:41,012 --> 01:00:44,223
I think it's Carpenter leaning
into his love of cinema

943
01:00:44,307 --> 01:00:47,518
and his love of genre cinema that works
as a shorthand for the viewer.

944
01:00:49,228 --> 01:00:52,231
It kind of gives the whole story,

945
01:00:52,315 --> 01:00:57,028
a sort of mythical aspect,
which I used to call, the--

946
01:00:57,111 --> 01:01:03,242
the-- the "Chinatown syndrome",
in that this thing has happened before.

947
01:01:03,326 --> 01:01:04,660
<i>Mac!</i>

948
01:01:08,206 --> 01:01:12,043
They find the guy that was frozen
and had slit marks on his wrist.

949
01:01:12,126 --> 01:01:13,669
We called him, the "sweet guy".

950
01:01:15,338 --> 01:01:17,548
And we had taken an impression
of our mold maker,

951
01:01:17,632 --> 01:01:20,718
Gunnar Ferdinandsen,
an expression like this.

952
01:01:20,802 --> 01:01:23,012
And the alginate went down his throat.

953
01:01:23,096 --> 01:01:25,556
And Gunnar did not move.

954
01:01:25,640 --> 01:01:29,644
When they removed it, this big trail
of alginate came out.

955
01:01:34,440 --> 01:01:40,321
Frozen blood uh, dripping from--
from a Norwegian dead scientist

956
01:01:40,405 --> 01:01:43,074
is so horrifyingly beautiful.

957
01:01:43,157 --> 01:01:47,412
And I think that it did feed
from art around it,

958
01:01:47,495 --> 01:01:50,248
like the bacon of it all,
the Goya of it all.

959
01:01:52,417 --> 01:01:56,629
And we took some clear fiberglass resin
and I tinted it the color of blood.

960
01:01:58,548 --> 01:02:01,342
And Rob asked me
if I could get some intestines.

961
01:02:02,468 --> 01:02:05,138
The company went up to Stewart,
British Columbia.

962
01:02:05,221 --> 01:02:08,474
And that stage was closed off.
And it was during the summer.

963
01:02:08,558 --> 01:02:11,394
We get a call from Universal Security.

964
01:02:11,477 --> 01:02:14,814
There's a s-- a smell,
something's dead in there.

965
01:02:14,897 --> 01:02:18,109
It's-- it's-- it's disgusting smell.

966
01:02:18,192 --> 01:02:20,361
So we sent Erik Jensen down there.

967
01:02:20,445 --> 01:02:24,490
And uh, he found that box of in--
pig intestines.

968
01:02:24,574 --> 01:02:27,201
That-- it had a stench,
it was unbelievable.

969
01:02:27,285 --> 01:02:29,495
Stunk up-- stunk up the whole set.

970
01:02:30,746 --> 01:02:31,998
<i>Come on, Doc.</i>

971
01:02:33,583 --> 01:02:36,586
There's a sense that a lot of these men
have been in Vietnam

972
01:02:36,669 --> 01:02:41,507
and are a bit battle-hardened
and possibly have trauma.

973
01:02:42,717 --> 01:02:45,720
And I think MacReady is
one of those people that has already

974
01:02:45,803 --> 01:02:48,431
been through some sort of hell.

975
01:02:48,514 --> 01:02:52,268
And he's one of the first,
possibly the only member

976
01:02:52,351 --> 01:02:56,481
of the crew to actually get a grip
of what's happening.

977
01:02:57,315 --> 01:03:00,151
He kind of understands it
at a primal level.

978
01:03:02,111 --> 01:03:06,115
I was kind of looking in my last viewing
if there were

979
01:03:06,199 --> 01:03:10,036
dog tags somewhere for him.
I was looking for them.

980
01:03:10,119 --> 01:03:13,998
Because it's so obvious
that this man knows

981
01:03:14,081 --> 01:03:16,292
how to survive a battlefield.

982
01:03:18,669 --> 01:03:20,046
- Certainly, the timing lines up.

983
01:03:20,129 --> 01:03:24,008
Everybody in that camp probably saw
some action somewhere.

984
01:03:24,091 --> 01:03:26,010
They're all over 30.

985
01:03:26,093 --> 01:03:29,847
So that means 10 years earlier
they were of draft age for Vietnam.

986
01:03:29,931 --> 01:03:33,226
Or in the case of some of these guys,
they were draft age for Korea.

987
01:03:34,727 --> 01:03:38,314
I think it is very much a Vietnam movie,
you know?

988
01:03:38,397 --> 01:03:42,151
I think that's part of why it's all men.

989
01:03:42,235 --> 01:03:43,861
You know, there is

990
01:03:43,945 --> 01:03:47,698
the way they look,
if you put those men together

991
01:03:47,782 --> 01:03:53,454
and you just put a uniform on them,
they're very much marines in Vietnam.

992
01:03:54,580 --> 01:03:59,669
So I think it's very much a-- a
child of the disillusionment.

993
01:03:59,752 --> 01:04:02,421
Yeah, I think the film is, you know,
a compendium of influences.

994
01:04:02,505 --> 01:04:05,132
Burdened by the Vietnam War, actually.

995
01:04:05,216 --> 01:04:07,468
Um, I was trying to get out of it.

996
01:04:07,552 --> 01:04:10,388
All of us, and including John,
and we were draft eligible

997
01:04:10,471 --> 01:04:12,557
during that time, uh, the war.

998
01:04:12,640 --> 01:04:14,475
I mean, I had a draft lottery number.

999
01:04:17,270 --> 01:04:20,648
- That's the helicopter pilot.
All things begin there.

1000
01:04:20,731 --> 01:04:22,108
See, when you're in the air
and you have a problem,

1001
01:04:22,191 --> 01:04:23,693
you've got to get it figured out.

1002
01:04:23,776 --> 01:04:26,237
You can't turn to somebody.
And go, "Um…"

1003
01:04:27,405 --> 01:04:28,990
There's nobody there.

1004
01:04:29,073 --> 01:04:31,909
And that's where I think the character
of MacReady,

1005
01:04:31,993 --> 01:04:33,411
he's already done that.

1006
01:04:33,494 --> 01:04:35,371
"I need to be able to be
in control of this."

1007
01:04:36,581 --> 01:04:38,666
<i>Is that a man in there or something?</i>

1008
01:04:41,043 --> 01:04:43,004
<i>Whatever it is,</i>
<i>they burned it up in a hurry.</i>

1009
01:04:43,087 --> 01:04:45,965
I remember Donald, when--
when we uncovered The Thing,

1010
01:04:46,048 --> 01:04:47,216
he went like this.

1011
01:04:49,677 --> 01:04:50,761
<i>We found this.</i>

1012
01:04:52,221 --> 01:04:53,639
<i>- Jesus Christ.</i>

1013
01:04:53,723 --> 01:04:59,895
And I imagine the same thing, that
it-- it-- it was a grotesque, awful smell.

1014
01:04:59,979 --> 01:05:03,107
I mean, my face is even taking it on
right now, you know?

1015
01:05:08,946 --> 01:05:13,534
I once went to a crematorium,
and they opened the back of it,

1016
01:05:13,618 --> 01:05:18,831
and I smelled decomposing flesh
for the first time in my life.

1017
01:05:18,914 --> 01:05:21,834
It's unmistakable what it is,

1018
01:05:21,917 --> 01:05:24,003
even though you've never seen
or smelled it.

1019
01:05:28,132 --> 01:05:31,510
- That was the first effect that
we worked on, first autopsy.

1020
01:05:31,594 --> 01:05:37,850
We had a big stack of different
body parts, fiberglass body parts.

1021
01:05:37,933 --> 01:05:40,478
And then Rob said,
"Hey, Ken, uh, can you figure a way

1022
01:05:40,561 --> 01:05:42,104
to stick all this stuff together?"

1023
01:05:43,397 --> 01:05:47,526
Rob was working on the split face, but
it was very much a collaborative effort.

1024
01:05:49,320 --> 01:05:54,200
It was a big conglomeration of things
with the like, the split head.

1025
01:05:54,283 --> 01:05:57,078
I remember being there
to help dress it for Rob

1026
01:05:57,161 --> 01:06:02,708
and paint blood veins in the Methocel
on this massive thing.

1027
01:06:04,543 --> 01:06:07,129
And the cast is sitting there,
and they're almost starting

1028
01:06:07,213 --> 01:06:09,090
to get to a point where they're waiting.

1029
01:06:09,173 --> 01:06:11,258
And I'm just like,
having to paint all this.

1030
01:06:11,342 --> 01:06:14,887
And I think Carpenter was like,
"Oh, I think that's enough now."

1031
01:06:14,970 --> 01:06:18,974
To try and get me to stop, because
Rob's like, "Keep going, keep going.

1032
01:06:25,272 --> 01:06:28,818
One of the most iconic images
is the split face creature

1033
01:06:28,901 --> 01:06:31,112
that's brought back
from the Norwegian camp.

1034
01:06:31,195 --> 01:06:34,699
That's probably the one image
that was released a lot in public.

1035
01:06:35,908 --> 01:06:39,870
We pictured like, aliens looking like,
you know,

1036
01:06:39,954 --> 01:06:42,748
something out of a 1950 sci-fi movie.

1037
01:06:42,832 --> 01:06:45,793
This was like a whole other thing,
literally.

1038
01:06:45,876 --> 01:06:49,296
You know, with all the-- the weird faces,
that kind of half-stretched face

1039
01:06:49,338 --> 01:06:51,257
that looks like something
out of <i>Basket Case</i>.

1040
01:06:54,969 --> 01:06:58,889
Well, the first real glimpse of The Thing
we see looks like

1041
01:06:58,973 --> 01:07:01,308
an Edvard Munch's <i>The Scream</i>.

1042
01:07:01,392 --> 01:07:04,979
You know, it's a--
it's an art project in a way.

1043
01:07:05,062 --> 01:07:10,067
It's quite horrific, because
you can just see that it is or was human.

1044
01:07:12,445 --> 01:07:15,948
That was an example of it
sort of absorbing

1045
01:07:16,031 --> 01:07:19,577
and recreating those,
because it's not necessarily

1046
01:07:19,660 --> 01:07:21,704
two people being joined together.

1047
01:07:21,746 --> 01:07:25,499
But in my mind, it was that creature

1048
01:07:25,583 --> 01:07:29,170
sort of being caught mid-transformation.

1049
01:07:31,255 --> 01:07:33,591
- That was an incredible way
for John Carpenter

1050
01:07:33,674 --> 01:07:35,551
to set the stage to sort of say,

1051
01:07:35,634 --> 01:07:38,804
"Okay, this is what the creature's
capable of."

1052
01:07:38,888 --> 01:07:41,474
And you go, "Oh my, they're in trouble.

1053
01:07:42,141 --> 01:07:43,934
Oh, my."

1054
01:07:45,728 --> 01:07:49,398
- I think that face has a certain
thematic heft to it in terms

1055
01:07:49,482 --> 01:07:51,817
of duality, and doubling, and paranoia.

1056
01:07:51,901 --> 01:07:57,865
I think it also has this sort of
unquantifiable, uncanny quality to it.

1057
01:07:57,948 --> 01:08:00,075
You know when you look at it--

1058
01:08:00,159 --> 01:08:01,702
Like if you look at
<i>American Werewolf in London</i>,

1059
01:08:01,786 --> 01:08:04,205
that's just-- it's a wolf,
but it's beautiful.

1060
01:08:04,288 --> 01:08:05,915
It's a beautiful sculpture,

1061
01:08:05,998 --> 01:08:09,919
and it's a beautiful-looking creature
in its way.

1062
01:08:10,002 --> 01:08:11,337
This looks wrong.

1063
01:08:12,630 --> 01:08:15,299
The-- the-- The Thing looks like
it doesn't belong here.

1064
01:08:15,382 --> 01:08:17,551
It's-- it's uncanny in the truest sense
of the word.

1065
01:08:17,635 --> 01:08:18,761
It is wrong.

1066
01:08:38,030 --> 01:08:39,615
<i>I don't know what the hell's in there,</i>

1067
01:08:39,698 --> 01:08:41,408
<i>but it's weird and pissed off,</i>
<i>whatever it is.</i>

1068
01:08:41,492 --> 01:08:42,743
<i>Bennings, go get Childs.</i>

1069
01:08:58,717 --> 01:09:01,136
- And when I heard
they were making the film,

1070
01:09:01,220 --> 01:09:04,890
I was really, really, really,
really interested.

1071
01:09:04,974 --> 01:09:08,269
My agent got a call saying
John wanted me to come in.

1072
01:09:09,854 --> 01:09:11,188
John and I knew each other.

1073
01:09:11,272 --> 01:09:15,067
We had mutual friends,
and we had socialized some.

1074
01:09:15,150 --> 01:09:17,444
He-- he knew my work,
I certainly knew his.

1075
01:09:17,528 --> 01:09:19,029
HEAVEN'S GATE [1980]

1076
01:09:19,113 --> 01:09:23,617
Uh, originally, when he asked me,
I mentioned Donald Moffat's part.

1077
01:09:23,701 --> 01:09:27,663
And John said, "No, I-- I-- I think
I got the guy for that."

1078
01:09:27,746 --> 01:09:29,832
He said,
"What else are you interested in?"

1079
01:09:29,915 --> 01:09:32,543
And I said,
"The one I relate to the most is

1080
01:09:32,626 --> 01:09:35,254
is actually Clark, the dog handler.

1081
01:09:35,337 --> 01:09:39,008
He's got a real presence,
and I love the fact that

1082
01:09:39,091 --> 01:09:40,885
all he cares about is the dogs,

1083
01:09:40,968 --> 01:09:43,429
and he doesn't really care
about the people."

1084
01:09:43,512 --> 01:09:47,182
<i>Easy. Easy. Yes.</i>

1085
01:09:49,351 --> 01:09:51,478
Richard had a great sense of humor.

1086
01:09:51,562 --> 01:09:53,689
Really good, but very, very dry.

1087
01:09:53,772 --> 01:09:58,944
And that slow delivery of his,
you know, which it's always measured.

1088
01:09:59,028 --> 01:10:04,199
And if you have that subtext of,
"Maybe you're not the person

1089
01:10:04,283 --> 01:10:08,162
I think you were",
it adds a layer of fear.

1090
01:10:09,246 --> 01:10:11,916
Richard Masur does that so beautifully.

1091
01:10:11,999 --> 01:10:15,127
He ostensibly is protecting
the dogs, right?

1092
01:10:15,210 --> 01:10:18,005
But he has that internal thing going on.

1093
01:10:18,088 --> 01:10:19,298
The camera loves it.

1094
01:10:19,381 --> 01:10:21,508
<i>Did you notice anything strange</i>
<i>about the dog?</i>

1095
01:10:21,592 --> 01:10:23,010
<i>Anything at all?</i>

1096
01:10:23,093 --> 01:10:24,803
<i>Strange? No.</i>

1097
01:10:24,887 --> 01:10:28,849
I had a University of Oregon T-shirt
on that I wore

1098
01:10:28,933 --> 01:10:32,436
almost through the whole film,
uh, you barely saw it.

1099
01:10:32,519 --> 01:10:35,481
The only thing I thought there,
this is the slightest piece

1100
01:10:35,564 --> 01:10:39,652
of backstory, was,
"Yeah, if-- if he went to college,

1101
01:10:39,735 --> 01:10:42,988
he probably went to someplace
like the University of Oregon",

1102
01:10:43,072 --> 01:10:49,495
which was kind of a outdoorsy,
open-thinking kind of a place.

1103
01:10:49,578 --> 01:10:52,456
And-- and then I-- I was absolutely sure

1104
01:10:52,539 --> 01:10:56,210
that he had dropped out and gone to do
what he loved to do,

1105
01:10:56,293 --> 01:10:58,754
which was probably gone to Alaska

1106
01:10:58,837 --> 01:11:02,716
or someplace else, and-- and learned
how to run dogs, so.

1107
01:11:05,427 --> 01:11:06,637
<i>Go ahead.</i>

1108
01:11:10,182 --> 01:11:11,767
<i>Go ahead. What are you waiting for?</i>

1109
01:11:12,685 --> 01:11:15,938
In the mid-'70s,
when makeup effects really

1110
01:11:16,021 --> 01:11:19,566
was thrust into the forefront…

1111
01:11:19,650 --> 01:11:21,944
<i>- By this sign of the Holy Cross!</i>

1112
01:11:22,027 --> 01:11:25,698
- The artists that created these effects,
Tom Savini,

1113
01:11:25,781 --> 01:11:29,618
Rick Baker, Stan Winston, and later Rob,

1114
01:11:29,702 --> 01:11:32,121
they became almost household names.

1115
01:11:34,123 --> 01:11:37,084
- And <i>Invasion of the Body Snatchers</i>
was remade

1116
01:11:37,167 --> 01:11:41,088
into something contemporary
and really believable

1117
01:11:41,171 --> 01:11:44,633
in a lot of ways,
better than the original movie.

1118
01:11:44,717 --> 01:11:48,137
<i>American Werewolf in London</i>
came out the year before,

1119
01:11:48,220 --> 01:11:52,307
and Rick Baker had done things
nobody had done before.

1120
01:11:56,061 --> 01:11:58,939
<i>The Thing</i> was the epitome
of that body horror movement.

1121
01:11:59,023 --> 01:12:01,608
Pretty sure, it's the movie
that got John Carpenter called

1122
01:12:01,692 --> 01:12:05,112
a pornographer,
because of how graphic it was.

1123
01:12:06,363 --> 01:12:08,365
That just tells me
he's doing everything right.

1124
01:12:09,783 --> 01:12:12,244
Talked to everybody.
I talked to everybody.

1125
01:12:12,327 --> 01:12:14,538
And all the special effects guys.

1126
01:12:18,333 --> 01:12:20,502
- So you didn't want to see a man
in a suit.

1127
01:12:20,586 --> 01:12:22,087
You didn't want to see a bug.

1128
01:12:22,171 --> 01:12:24,715
Anything necessarily alien or Geiger-like.

1129
01:12:24,798 --> 01:12:25,799
I think I might have brought it up.

1130
01:12:25,883 --> 01:12:28,385
It was dismissed almost immediately
by John.

1131
01:12:28,469 --> 01:12:30,345
I mean, the designs for <i>Alien</i>
were so distinctive.

1132
01:12:30,429 --> 01:12:34,975
You know, he wanted to move as far away
from that as possible anyway.

1133
01:12:35,059 --> 01:12:38,437
We have a meeting with a gentleman
named Dale Kuipers

1134
01:12:38,520 --> 01:12:40,355
to design The Thing.

1135
01:12:40,439 --> 01:12:43,901
Dale Kuipers had worked on <i>Caveman</i>.

1136
01:12:43,984 --> 01:12:45,069
John knew about Dale.

1137
01:12:45,152 --> 01:12:49,531
And so Dale came in very shy.
Very shy man from Michigan.

1138
01:12:51,283 --> 01:12:55,496
And you know, there was a bunch
of different early concept sketches.

1139
01:12:55,579 --> 01:12:59,458
A creature that was designed
that was very crab-like.

1140
01:13:00,876 --> 01:13:02,795
John's sitting in his office looking
at the sketch, figuring out,

1141
01:13:02,878 --> 01:13:07,257
"How the fuck can I make
this big mechanical puppet".

1142
01:13:07,341 --> 01:13:09,384
We had to move from Dale to someone else.

1143
01:13:09,468 --> 01:13:11,553
And that someone else became Rob Bottin.

1144
01:13:13,597 --> 01:13:15,432
Rob, of course, had appeared in <i>The Fog</i>

1145
01:13:15,516 --> 01:13:18,519
and done some stuff with John
until they knew each other.

1146
01:13:18,602 --> 01:13:20,312
And it seemed, you know, at this point,

1147
01:13:20,395 --> 01:13:22,481
it's like, it's--
it's a natural way to go.

1148
01:13:22,564 --> 01:13:27,569
Even for this 6 point--
6-foot-2-inch-tall guy,

1149
01:13:27,653 --> 01:13:30,697
22 years old, with--
with big broad shoulders, you know?

1150
01:13:32,241 --> 01:13:35,702
<i>The Howling</i> had just been released
or about to be released.

1151
01:13:35,786 --> 01:13:37,621
We saw it. We knew it was great.

1152
01:13:37,704 --> 01:13:40,624
Only question was, "Could he do it
under this sort of pressure?"

1153
01:13:40,707 --> 01:13:43,752
I mean, 'cause John at one point said,
"Look, this guy is the film." You know?

1154
01:13:43,836 --> 01:13:46,672
"And if this-- if this doesn't work,
you know, nothing's gonna work."

1155
01:13:48,090 --> 01:13:50,050
Before we hired him, at John's behest,

1156
01:13:50,134 --> 01:13:54,304
I took one last meeting with Rick Baker,
who at the time was

1157
01:13:54,388 --> 01:13:57,891
right in the middle
of <i>American Werewolf in London</i>.

1158
01:13:57,975 --> 01:14:00,561
And the idea behind the meeting
was not to get Rick to do the film.

1159
01:14:00,644 --> 01:14:06,275
But whether Rick could work
as a uh, as an advisor to Rob.

1160
01:14:06,358 --> 01:14:09,778
You know, should Rob need help,
should Rob need advice.

1161
01:14:09,862 --> 01:14:12,239
John's concern was, you know,
whether he could deliver.

1162
01:14:12,322 --> 01:14:13,574
Whether Rob could deliver.

1163
01:14:14,575 --> 01:14:15,826
Rick, there was no way he could do it.

1164
01:14:15,909 --> 01:14:19,163
He was right in the middle
of the werewolf. His schedule was full.

1165
01:14:19,246 --> 01:14:23,083
So we uh, we went ahead and--
and it became Rob.

1166
01:14:24,293 --> 01:14:25,627
Smartest man on the film.

1167
01:14:26,295 --> 01:14:28,046
HARTLAND CREW

1168
01:14:28,130 --> 01:14:31,300
- We were given a-- a facility
called, "Universal Hartland".

1169
01:14:31,383 --> 01:14:35,429
That was in North Hollywood.
It was a uh, a larger facility.

1170
01:14:35,512 --> 01:14:36,847
It had been a shooting stage.

1171
01:14:36,930 --> 01:14:39,808
They had shot uh, <i>Buck Rogers</i> there.

1172
01:14:39,892 --> 01:14:41,935
The original <i>Star Trek</i> movie.

1173
01:14:42,019 --> 01:14:44,813
Uh, there were still some props there
when we-- we moved in.

1174
01:14:46,773 --> 01:14:52,487
The plan originally was to do a lot
of the work with First Unit.

1175
01:14:52,571 --> 01:14:55,699
However, the effects were very involved

1176
01:14:55,782 --> 01:14:58,827
and sometimes very labor intensive.

1177
01:15:00,746 --> 01:15:03,832
- I've known Rob
since he started high school.

1178
01:15:04,583 --> 01:15:07,544
So he was probably about 13.

1179
01:15:07,628 --> 01:15:10,172
And so he was a family friend.

1180
01:15:11,131 --> 01:15:14,635
At that point he also is
when he met Rick Baker.

1181
01:15:14,718 --> 01:15:18,347
But then Rob got a movie
where he was making an ape suit.

1182
01:15:18,430 --> 01:15:20,766
That was one of his first projects.

1183
01:15:20,849 --> 01:15:23,852
And so he knew that I was in hair school.

1184
01:15:23,936 --> 01:15:26,146
So he wanted me to help him with it.

1185
01:15:26,230 --> 01:15:29,608
So I just was cutting up wigs
and sewing wefts

1186
01:15:29,691 --> 01:15:33,403
on a spandex suit for a movie called,
"<i>Tanya's Island</i>".

1187
01:15:33,487 --> 01:15:35,572
And then he got <i>The Howling</i>.

1188
01:15:35,656 --> 01:15:38,742
And so he asked me
if I wanted to work on it with him.

1189
01:15:38,825 --> 01:15:43,247
That's basically how I started on--
on <i>The Thing</i> was

1190
01:15:43,330 --> 01:15:44,957
'cause Rob and I-- I--

1191
01:15:45,040 --> 01:15:47,918
He's kind of like another brother for me.

1192
01:15:49,711 --> 01:15:54,800
I uh, first met a childhood friend
of Rob Bottin

1193
01:15:54,883 --> 01:15:56,260
named Vince Prentice.

1194
01:15:56,343 --> 01:16:01,640
Vince told me many stories of him
and Rob's childhood escapades.

1195
01:16:01,723 --> 01:16:06,853
How they used to do stunt work
and do little home movies and stuff.

1196
01:16:06,937 --> 01:16:10,232
And then uh, Vince told me that
Rob was actually apprenticing

1197
01:16:10,315 --> 01:16:12,025
with Rick Baker.

1198
01:16:12,109 --> 01:16:17,197
And had worked on films like
<i>The Incredible Melting Man</i>. <i>King Kong</i>.

1199
01:16:17,281 --> 01:16:20,617
And then some work on the cantina scene
on the first <i>Star Wars</i>.

1200
01:16:21,827 --> 01:16:27,291
And I first actually met Rob in 1977
on the set of <i>Piranha</i>.

1201
01:16:28,500 --> 01:16:33,005
And they were doing underwater photography
with little mechanical piranhas.

1202
01:16:35,382 --> 01:16:41,263
In 1981, I was working with Carlo Rambaldi
on the film <i>E.T.</i>

1203
01:16:41,346 --> 01:16:45,517
And I was doing test paint jobs
on the different <i>E.T.</i> heads.

1204
01:16:48,812 --> 01:16:51,773
A short time later I got a call
from Vince Prentice.

1205
01:16:51,857 --> 01:16:53,317
And said, "Hey Ken.

1206
01:16:53,400 --> 01:16:55,652
Rob's starting up a new movie
called, "<i>The Thing</i>".

1207
01:16:55,736 --> 01:16:58,780
And we have all kinds of different
creatures we're gonna be creating.

1208
01:16:58,864 --> 01:17:00,657
And he wants to know
if you want to come work on it."

1209
01:17:00,741 --> 01:17:03,327
"Heck, man." I go, "Yeah.

1210
01:17:03,410 --> 01:17:06,038
We're working on a-- I'm working on
this silly-looking alien here.

1211
01:17:06,121 --> 01:17:08,623
I'm gonna go out and do some
great work with these guys."

1212
01:17:10,959 --> 01:17:13,378
- I had been working on a film
called, "Dragonslayer"

1213
01:17:13,462 --> 01:17:14,713
to Industrial Light and Magic.

1214
01:17:14,796 --> 01:17:16,131
Flew back on the plane.

1215
01:17:16,214 --> 01:17:20,969
And my memory tells me that Rob picked
me up at the airport. Rob Bottin.

1216
01:17:21,053 --> 01:17:24,973
And at that time, he-- he told me
about <i>The Thing</i>.

1217
01:17:26,183 --> 01:17:27,517
We had a script.

1218
01:17:27,601 --> 01:17:31,396
He had a hell of a lot of ideas
about what he wanted to do.

1219
01:17:31,480 --> 01:17:34,399
Pretty wild. Pretty out there.

1220
01:17:34,483 --> 01:17:37,361
Where the really uh,
interesting stuff was going on

1221
01:17:37,444 --> 01:17:42,449
was actually Rob in his area
with Mike Ploog.

1222
01:17:42,532 --> 01:17:46,119
Because that's all they were doing
was just concepts

1223
01:17:46,203 --> 01:17:49,873
of what-- what kind of creatures
could be formed.

1224
01:17:51,166 --> 01:17:54,544
And one of the greatest horror
comic book artists is Mike Ploog.

1225
01:17:56,004 --> 01:18:01,051
He created Ghost Rider.
His art is so specific.

1226
01:18:01,134 --> 01:18:03,637
Especially in the horror genre.
It's just amazing.

1227
01:18:04,596 --> 01:18:07,349
Definitely a-- a guy
who can imagine something

1228
01:18:07,432 --> 01:18:08,892
if you can describe it.

1229
01:18:10,227 --> 01:18:13,605
And I think that Rob's imagination, uh,

1230
01:18:13,688 --> 01:18:18,860
Mike Ploog's aesthetic kind of
mutated together.

1231
01:18:18,944 --> 01:18:23,407
'Cause you needed someone
who could be not constrained

1232
01:18:23,490 --> 01:18:27,702
by, you know, the classical forms.

1233
01:18:30,330 --> 01:18:31,832
We needed storyboards

1234
01:18:31,915 --> 01:18:36,378
and potentially artistic renditions
of The Thing itself.

1235
01:18:36,461 --> 01:18:40,048
And he was in our shop with us.
We had an-- an office for him.

1236
01:18:42,801 --> 01:18:46,054
- You know, they published
Mike Ploog's drawings.

1237
01:18:46,138 --> 01:18:48,765
You know, the storyboards
and his illustrations.

1238
01:18:48,849 --> 01:18:51,977
Some of those were published
in Cinefantastique magazine.

1239
01:18:52,060 --> 01:18:57,482
And it gave you a really good glimpse
into how it was done,

1240
01:18:57,566 --> 01:18:58,900
the behind-the-scenes.

1241
01:19:05,866 --> 01:19:11,455
I think the kennel sequence
is really enjoyable to watch.

1242
01:19:11,538 --> 01:19:13,582
Because every time they cut back,

1243
01:19:13,665 --> 01:19:16,168
The Thing is mutated
into something different.

1244
01:19:16,251 --> 01:19:18,753
And it's so perfectly done
with the sound effects

1245
01:19:18,837 --> 01:19:20,547
and when the dog walks in.

1246
01:19:23,592 --> 01:19:27,304
So, the first instance of The Thing
feeling threatened

1247
01:19:27,387 --> 01:19:32,768
and showing itself almost prematurely,
uh, because

1248
01:19:32,851 --> 01:19:34,978
it wants to defend itself or escape.

1249
01:19:38,023 --> 01:19:43,695
We were basically tasked
with coming up with duplicate jets

1250
01:19:43,778 --> 01:19:46,114
for effects, different effects.

1251
01:19:47,365 --> 01:19:50,660
- The dog that's just sitting there
in the very beginning that's just straight

1252
01:19:50,744 --> 01:19:55,999
and it's starting to shake,
that was a taxidermy dog.

1253
01:19:57,250 --> 01:20:00,795
- We went to a rendering plant
in the City of Vernon.

1254
01:20:00,879 --> 01:20:04,299
Every morning, trucks from all over
Los Angeles County

1255
01:20:04,382 --> 01:20:10,555
would come and bring dogs and cats
that had been euthanized or roadkill.

1256
01:20:10,639 --> 01:20:12,891
We'd give 'em a-- a case of beer every day

1257
01:20:12,974 --> 01:20:15,727
we went down there just
so they'd work with us.

1258
01:20:15,810 --> 01:20:19,022
And I used to drive a little
Pinto station wagon.

1259
01:20:19,105 --> 01:20:22,275
And I had to go to a taxidermist.

1260
01:20:22,359 --> 01:20:26,196
And they put this dog in the back of my--

1261
01:20:26,279 --> 01:20:29,950
of my station wagon facing
the-- out the back.

1262
01:20:30,033 --> 01:20:32,661
People are like staring
at the back of the car.

1263
01:20:32,744 --> 01:20:35,247
It's like, "Why isn't that dog moving?"

1264
01:20:38,625 --> 01:20:41,753
- The animated dog was all on
like-- like hydraulics.

1265
01:20:43,004 --> 01:20:47,801
They had to pump air
into the animation of the dog.

1266
01:20:47,884 --> 01:20:50,470
But it looked so real when I came in,
it was like, "Oh!

1267
01:20:51,388 --> 01:20:53,473
Oh, it doesn't-- it doesn't,
it's not moving."

1268
01:20:53,557 --> 01:20:56,977
Then when they started pumping
that air in it and it starts…

1269
01:20:57,477 --> 01:21:00,105
It was like, "That is fascinating."

1270
01:21:07,487 --> 01:21:09,698
And the dog's head begins to split open

1271
01:21:09,781 --> 01:21:12,284
and you don't know what you're--
he explained it to us, you know?

1272
01:21:12,367 --> 01:21:16,454
We saw drawings and stuff,
but it was like, "Well, okay."

1273
01:21:18,707 --> 01:21:22,794
Rob always likes to push things to see
how far he can take it.

1274
01:21:22,877 --> 01:21:24,254
And it looked cool.

1275
01:21:25,839 --> 01:21:27,716
- And people talk about design,
I always say,

1276
01:21:27,799 --> 01:21:31,011
"Well, there's two elements
to makeup effects and monsters.

1277
01:21:31,094 --> 01:21:32,762
Horror and beauty."

1278
01:21:32,846 --> 01:21:35,640
If they don't have both,
it's not memorable. Right?

1279
01:21:35,682 --> 01:21:39,019
And the-- the moment the--
the head of the dog flowers out.

1280
01:21:39,144 --> 01:21:39,686
Yeah.

1281
01:21:39,728 --> 01:21:43,189
Is like a choreographic moment
of great beauty.

1282
01:21:49,529 --> 01:21:51,948
The hoses. We called them,
the "hissing hoses",

1283
01:21:52,032 --> 01:21:55,076
which were like these tentacles
that would come out and fly around.

1284
01:21:56,411 --> 01:21:58,913
Motivated by uh, air pressure.

1285
01:22:06,588 --> 01:22:07,464
The sound and the…

1286
01:22:08,423 --> 01:22:10,634
You can't quite process it,
'cause you've never seen

1287
01:22:10,717 --> 01:22:11,926
anything like it before.

1288
01:22:17,766 --> 01:22:20,769
And then also in the dog kennel
was a chicken dog

1289
01:22:20,852 --> 01:22:23,855
that he gave Stan Winston to do.

1290
01:22:25,231 --> 01:22:29,653
- I think Rob felt that the workload
was becoming overwhelming.

1291
01:22:29,736 --> 01:22:32,947
I fought against it. I didn't wanna…

1292
01:22:32,989 --> 01:22:35,325
'Cause I knew Stan was gonna get
all the credit.

1293
01:22:36,785 --> 01:22:38,870
The timing was perfect, by the way,

1294
01:22:38,953 --> 01:22:42,916
because uh, the shop uh,
was a little slow at the time.

1295
01:22:42,999 --> 01:22:45,835
Uh, he had a few-- a few you know,
team members there,

1296
01:22:45,919 --> 01:22:50,006
Lance Anderson, Michiko Tagawa,
uh, Jim Cagle.

1297
01:22:50,882 --> 01:22:55,303
Stan was blown away by what Jim Henson
did uh, with regard

1298
01:22:55,387 --> 01:22:59,933
to you know, applying the puppetry
he developed.

1299
01:23:00,016 --> 01:23:02,310
Fortunately, that's where he w--
his head was

1300
01:23:02,394 --> 01:23:03,895
when Rob approached him.

1301
01:23:06,272 --> 01:23:10,193
Isn't it interesting
how all these artists, Rick Baker,

1302
01:23:10,276 --> 01:23:12,028
Stan Winston, Rob Bottin, those were like

1303
01:23:12,112 --> 01:23:16,324
the three massive,
the three pillars of cr--

1304
01:23:16,366 --> 01:23:18,076
we didn't even call it,
"practical effects".

1305
01:23:18,159 --> 01:23:21,287
And they all had their individual takes.

1306
01:23:24,582 --> 01:23:28,002
- On the dog thing,
they took a mold of Lance

1307
01:23:28,086 --> 01:23:30,046
in a position, you know, with his arm.

1308
01:23:30,130 --> 01:23:33,842
So you had the dog's body here.
And then you had the neck.

1309
01:23:33,925 --> 01:23:35,969
And then here. So it's just a hand puppet.

1310
01:23:39,222 --> 01:23:41,850
And once that was completed,
they brought that back

1311
01:23:41,933 --> 01:23:48,022
to uh, Hartland and we added a--
a big tongue, mechanical tongue.

1312
01:23:48,106 --> 01:23:51,276
And then we had tentacles
that were-- we shot in reverse.

1313
01:23:57,949 --> 01:24:00,702
The slimed dog that's in the corner.

1314
01:24:00,785 --> 01:24:02,328
I was puppeteering it from behind.

1315
01:24:02,412 --> 01:24:06,249
I had a-- the muzzle the--
and-- and one of the hands.

1316
01:24:06,332 --> 01:24:08,251
And Vince Prentice was doing
the other legs.

1317
01:24:08,334 --> 01:24:11,004
Vince was trying to pull
the tentacles away.

1318
01:24:11,087 --> 01:24:12,297
And he ran out of room.

1319
01:24:12,380 --> 01:24:16,426
So he just starts spinning around,
wrapping the tentacles around himself.

1320
01:24:16,509 --> 01:24:19,387
And Rob, "More, more, more.
Pull, pull, pull."

1321
01:24:25,935 --> 01:24:31,316
And when it absorbs the dogs,
the dogs become a repeating motif.

1322
01:24:31,399 --> 01:24:33,818
And I believe that
it had never come in contact

1323
01:24:33,902 --> 01:24:36,404
with an animal like that before.

1324
01:24:36,488 --> 01:24:41,534
So maybe that DNA was sort of fresh
in its metamorphosis.

1325
01:24:42,535 --> 01:24:45,997
The thing reaches up and punches
through the ceiling.

1326
01:24:47,916 --> 01:24:51,628
And Rob was wearing some gloves.

1327
01:24:51,711 --> 01:24:54,422
These rubber gloves uh, with slime on 'em.

1328
01:24:54,506 --> 01:24:57,425
And he punched through this--
the uh, top of the ceiling.

1329
01:25:00,970 --> 01:25:04,015
We can see part of it escaping
into the ceiling.

1330
01:25:04,098 --> 01:25:05,892
And nobody goes after that.

1331
01:25:10,563 --> 01:25:15,610
I had never known that those petals
were tongues of dogs.

1332
01:25:15,693 --> 01:25:18,905
And that the teeth
that are inside are dog teeth.

1333
01:25:18,988 --> 01:25:24,786
So that that was a version of The Thing
reprocessing the dogs.

1334
01:25:24,869 --> 01:25:27,789
'Cause I always thought it was like
a weird flower creature

1335
01:25:27,872 --> 01:25:29,707
from another planet.

1336
01:25:30,875 --> 01:25:33,837
I've seen on posts that people comment.

1337
01:25:33,920 --> 01:25:35,672
It says if you freeze frame shot,

1338
01:25:35,755 --> 01:25:38,633
you could see a silhouette
in the back of the head.

1339
01:25:38,716 --> 01:25:42,220
Uh, someone back there.
And that's actually me.

1340
01:25:45,181 --> 01:25:46,432
<i>Get your ass over here!</i>

1341
01:25:48,560 --> 01:25:49,227
<i>Burn it.</i>

1342
01:25:49,310 --> 01:25:53,147
I loved the fact that my character has

1343
01:25:53,231 --> 01:25:56,192
the responsibility of having
the flamethrower, you know?

1344
01:25:56,276 --> 01:25:58,111
"I'm gonna be a badass", you know?

1345
01:25:59,571 --> 01:26:01,281
<i>Damn it, Childs. Torch it!</i>

1346
01:26:01,364 --> 01:26:04,284
The responsibility of holding that thing

1347
01:26:04,367 --> 01:26:06,911
will put a little color in your shorts,

1348
01:26:06,995 --> 01:26:09,747
because it's got like a hair trigger.

1349
01:26:09,831 --> 01:26:13,835
All you got to do is tap it.
And that thing, psss!

1350
01:26:13,918 --> 01:26:20,091
And it projects 20 or 30 feet.
Even if you just tap it.

1351
01:26:20,174 --> 01:26:23,970
At the same time, I was pumped up
and happy, I was also…

1352
01:26:26,222 --> 01:26:27,307
…scared shitless.

1353
01:27:09,307 --> 01:27:13,311
Uh, it's really funny, 'cause now
I'm older than Wilford Brimley

1354
01:27:13,394 --> 01:27:16,064
was in <i>The Thing</i>,
which kind of blows my mind.

1355
01:27:16,940 --> 01:27:19,192
'Cause as a kid
he was like such an old man.

1356
01:27:20,652 --> 01:27:21,778
<i>- Oh my God.</i>

1357
01:27:21,861 --> 01:27:27,784
Wilford Brimley was cast as Blair,
it's a kind of vital role.

1358
01:27:29,786 --> 01:27:31,871
- He's the one who figures it out
at first.

1359
01:27:31,955 --> 01:27:32,830
Asking the questions,

1360
01:27:32,914 --> 01:27:35,166
how long before the entire world
is infected.

1361
01:27:35,250 --> 01:27:37,919
So we understand his descent
into a little bit

1362
01:27:38,002 --> 01:27:39,128
of paranoid madness.

1363
01:27:41,005 --> 01:27:42,507
- When Brimley came in to meet us,

1364
01:27:42,590 --> 01:27:44,425
John offered him the role on the spot.

1365
01:27:45,969 --> 01:27:48,262
<i>How long were you alone with that dog?</i>

1366
01:27:48,346 --> 01:27:52,934
Blair is one of the first to be uh,
infected or absorbed.

1367
01:27:53,810 --> 01:27:57,981
And that we wanted to make sure
that when he was off-camera,

1368
01:27:58,064 --> 01:28:00,650
that the audience not think about
that character too much.

1369
01:28:02,402 --> 01:28:05,488
Now Will had been a stuntman for years.

1370
01:28:05,571 --> 01:28:09,909
He stood in for Burt Lancaster
and Kirk Douglas,

1371
01:28:09,993 --> 01:28:13,121
he knew all these guys.
He was a real cowboy.

1372
01:28:18,793 --> 01:28:20,503
And I think at the time,

1373
01:28:20,586 --> 01:28:25,466
<i>China Syndrome</i>
had just kicked his career way up.

1374
01:28:25,550 --> 01:28:27,385
And here he is and…

1375
01:28:30,471 --> 01:28:33,224
He was just the funniest man in the world.

1376
01:28:34,934 --> 01:28:38,354
- And Will Brimley was sort of like
everyone's dad.

1377
01:28:38,438 --> 01:28:41,607
And I'd-- I've never seen anything
like this before or since.

1378
01:28:41,691 --> 01:28:47,447
But Will would be doing rope tricks.

1379
01:28:47,530 --> 01:28:49,824
And they would stop work.

1380
01:28:49,907 --> 01:28:54,078
Imagine on a feature film. Even in 1981.

1381
01:28:54,162 --> 01:28:57,331
It's hundreds of thousands
of dollars an hour.

1382
01:28:57,415 --> 01:29:01,836
And John allowed all the work to stop
for Will to be telling

1383
01:29:01,919 --> 01:29:05,715
a story about who knows what,

1384
01:29:05,798 --> 01:29:09,510
while he was doing rope tricks.

1385
01:29:09,594 --> 01:29:13,598
Will Brimley and I went back to horses.

1386
01:29:13,681 --> 01:29:15,558
I-- I had looked at some horses.

1387
01:29:15,641 --> 01:29:18,394
And was thinking about buying
some horses from uh, Will,

1388
01:29:18,478 --> 01:29:19,604
which I didn't do.

1389
01:29:19,687 --> 01:29:22,398
So the first day I showed up for--

1390
01:29:22,482 --> 01:29:24,817
I think we were rehearsing or something.

1391
01:29:24,901 --> 01:29:28,237
And he, very Wilford style,
he says, "You never called me."

1392
01:29:29,947 --> 01:29:31,908
<i>What the hell are you looking at me</i>
<i>like that for?</i>

1393
01:29:33,367 --> 01:29:35,203
- We were talking about the next scene.

1394
01:29:35,286 --> 01:29:38,498
And Wilford is sitting there in his chair
and he's doing this…

1395
01:29:40,625 --> 01:29:43,377
And we're-- you know,
we're all going, "What?"

1396
01:29:43,461 --> 01:29:46,005
You know? And he says,

1397
01:29:46,089 --> 01:29:48,925
"You boys still think this picture
is about us.

1398
01:29:49,008 --> 01:29:51,761
It's not about us.
It's about the rubber guy."

1399
01:29:51,844 --> 01:29:53,221
That was his line.

1400
01:29:53,304 --> 01:29:56,474
But it was really true in some ways.

1401
01:29:59,310 --> 01:30:02,563
One theory about who's who
in <i>The Thing</i> by the way, uh,

1402
01:30:02,647 --> 01:30:04,107
might have to do with facial hair.

1403
01:30:07,235 --> 01:30:11,739
Rob Bottin mandated that
any of the actors involved

1404
01:30:11,823 --> 01:30:14,283
with the effect sequences be clean shaven.

1405
01:30:14,367 --> 01:30:17,954
And this meant Will would have to have
his famous mustache shaved.

1406
01:30:18,037 --> 01:30:19,914
I fell to John to ask him to do it,

1407
01:30:19,997 --> 01:30:21,916
which he fortunately agreed to do.

1408
01:30:26,087 --> 01:30:29,090
John Carpenter has so many scenes in which

1409
01:30:29,173 --> 01:30:32,927
there are up to a dozen characters
in the same frame.

1410
01:30:34,011 --> 01:30:36,848
And yet no one is standing around
looking awkward.

1411
01:30:38,683 --> 01:30:41,477
I remember Tarantino telling me
on <i>Hateful Eight</i> that he's like,

1412
01:30:41,561 --> 01:30:43,437
"Oh, I'm gonna shoot 70 millimeters."

1413
01:30:43,521 --> 01:30:46,190
Every single person, I got to deal
with what they're doing

1414
01:30:46,274 --> 01:30:48,151
at that moment in time.

1415
01:30:48,234 --> 01:30:51,154
I don't know what
Carpenter's direction method is.

1416
01:30:51,237 --> 01:30:52,905
Whether he rehearses it with the actors

1417
01:30:52,989 --> 01:30:55,783
or he sets up the camera
and tells them where to go.

1418
01:30:55,867 --> 01:30:58,411
But it looks effortless.
And it looks very natural.

1419
01:30:58,494 --> 01:31:00,037
And that's the hardest thing to do.

1420
01:31:03,249 --> 01:31:06,294
<i>- Look. Son of a bitch, oh.</i>

1421
01:31:06,377 --> 01:31:09,964
This thing dog, you know,
you only see it in the movie

1422
01:31:10,047 --> 01:31:12,425
for maybe five setups.

1423
01:31:12,508 --> 01:31:14,886
But when you look at the piece,

1424
01:31:14,969 --> 01:31:19,891
you see elements of the sculpture
that are absolutely fascinating.

1425
01:31:21,934 --> 01:31:27,106
Rob was the one who,
when he was auditioning for me,

1426
01:31:27,190 --> 01:31:31,068
to do the-- the rubber,
to do the creature,

1427
01:31:31,152 --> 01:31:35,281
he said that the opportunity is
it can look like anything.

1428
01:31:36,574 --> 01:31:41,621
It can look like all the creatures that
it has imitated in the universe.

1429
01:31:41,704 --> 01:31:43,372
And that was the secret to me.

1430
01:31:43,456 --> 01:31:46,751
"Oh! Now we can do something different.

1431
01:31:46,834 --> 01:31:50,087
Now we can really show our stuff."

1432
01:31:53,341 --> 01:31:55,259
This is a Hawks creature.
A Howard Hawks creature.

1433
01:31:55,343 --> 01:31:57,511
A creature defined by its actions.

1434
01:31:57,595 --> 01:32:00,431
How many planets had this thing gone to?

1435
01:32:00,514 --> 01:32:05,269
So how many other life forms
could be incorporated

1436
01:32:05,353 --> 01:32:08,481
with human life forms
or animal life forms on Earth?

1437
01:32:08,564 --> 01:32:11,817
Which opened it up even more.

1438
01:32:11,901 --> 01:32:15,780
Who knows why it had to leave
the planet that it was on.

1439
01:32:15,863 --> 01:32:21,118
But it survived by understanding
how it could emulate,

1440
01:32:21,202 --> 01:32:25,998
it could continue its organism
by entering a different organism.

1441
01:32:26,082 --> 01:32:28,542
Going from planet to planet,
to planet, to planet, to planet.

1442
01:32:28,626 --> 01:32:33,297
<i>When this thing attacked our dogs,</i>
<i>it tried to digest 'em. Absorb them.</i>

1443
01:32:34,548 --> 01:32:37,635
<i>And in the process shape</i>
<i>its own cells to imitate them.</i>

1444
01:32:37,718 --> 01:32:42,056
The thing that interested me
from the astrobiology standpoint here

1445
01:32:42,139 --> 01:32:45,184
is the ability of this being

1446
01:32:45,268 --> 01:32:51,315
to morph into whatever it attacks
and absorbs

1447
01:32:51,399 --> 01:32:53,567
in-- in-- in-- in some ways.

1448
01:32:53,651 --> 01:32:57,571
<i>This for instance. That's not dog.</i>

1449
01:33:00,199 --> 01:33:05,454
We know on Earth creatures
that are capable of mimetism.

1450
01:33:05,538 --> 01:33:07,957
Looking like the stuff around.

1451
01:33:09,917 --> 01:33:12,044
It's Blair who says it's a mimic.

1452
01:33:12,128 --> 01:33:13,379
<i>- You see what we're talking about here</i>

1453
01:33:13,462 --> 01:33:16,173
<i>is an organism that imitates</i>
<i>other life forms.</i>

1454
01:33:16,257 --> 01:33:18,134
<i>And it imitates 'em perfectly.</i>

1455
01:33:18,217 --> 01:33:22,930
When you take that as literally
as the movie pre-- presents it,

1456
01:33:23,014 --> 01:33:25,558
you know, the mimic doesn't really
have its own identity.

1457
01:33:25,641 --> 01:33:29,186
The mimic on-- it is-- it is--
simply exists as a mimic.

1458
01:33:31,272 --> 01:33:32,606
- He had tentacles.

1459
01:33:32,690 --> 01:33:35,693
Uh, it's not like it swallowed an octopus.

1460
01:33:35,776 --> 01:33:38,154
The tentacles had to come from someplace.

1461
01:33:38,237 --> 01:33:43,826
And it has insectile parts.
And it-- and it has squid parts.

1462
01:33:43,909 --> 01:33:46,871
And it has fangs. And it's part dog.

1463
01:33:46,954 --> 01:33:50,833
And it's part crab. And it's part dragon.

1464
01:33:52,043 --> 01:33:56,922
There is something in its metabolism
that allows

1465
01:33:57,006 --> 01:34:01,927
that being to become the thing
that it actually kills.

1466
01:34:02,011 --> 01:34:07,933
If DNA or if amino acids
are the vehicle to create,

1467
01:34:08,017 --> 01:34:12,146
then it might be that
an advanced civilization

1468
01:34:12,229 --> 01:34:15,274
could be capable of creating

1469
01:34:15,358 --> 01:34:20,613
a sort of a library of bases.

1470
01:34:20,654 --> 01:34:22,656
And-- and just play with that.

1471
01:34:24,033 --> 01:34:24,950
<i>- It's imitation.</i>

1472
01:34:25,034 --> 01:34:27,495
<i>We got to it before it had time to finish.</i>

1473
01:34:29,663 --> 01:34:30,706
<i>Finish what?</i>

1474
01:34:31,832 --> 01:34:33,918
<i>Finish imitating these dogs.</i>

1475
01:34:34,752 --> 01:34:37,004
I only saw this for the first time
the other day.

1476
01:34:37,088 --> 01:34:38,547
I actually saw it on Reddit.

1477
01:34:39,799 --> 01:34:41,258
'Cause I was dipping into--

1478
01:34:41,342 --> 01:34:44,887
I sometimes just dip into movies
or stories that I like

1479
01:34:44,970 --> 01:34:47,014
to see how other people think about them.

1480
01:34:47,098 --> 01:34:48,933
And for the very first time
I noticed that somebody else

1481
01:34:49,016 --> 01:34:52,061
noticed that Wilford Brimley pokes
at it with the-- the--

1482
01:34:52,144 --> 01:34:55,272
the eraser and then touches it
to his bottom lip

1483
01:34:55,356 --> 01:34:56,399
for just a second.

1484
01:34:56,482 --> 01:35:00,444
Not-- not in, just literally touches it
right there like,

1485
01:35:00,528 --> 01:35:03,155
he's thinking.
Like, "That's it, he's done."

1486
01:35:03,239 --> 01:35:06,450
He knows that they're doomed.
And he loses his mind.

1487
01:35:06,534 --> 01:35:10,413
And he will become the first one
to sound the alarm

1488
01:35:10,496 --> 01:35:12,665
and the last carrier. Both.

1489
01:35:14,375 --> 01:35:17,044
Blair is the biggest threat to it.

1490
01:35:17,128 --> 01:35:20,339
And therefore, decides to take care
of business immediately.

1491
01:35:20,423 --> 01:35:24,510
So Blair is probably a creature
throughout the entire film.

1492
01:35:43,779 --> 01:35:46,407
<i>Jesus, how long you figure</i>
<i>this has been in the ice?</i>

1493
01:35:57,334 --> 01:35:58,669
<i>- Where'd they take these shots?</i>

1494
01:36:00,212 --> 01:36:01,922
<i>Seems like they were spending</i>
<i>a lot of their time</i>

1495
01:36:02,006 --> 01:36:04,967
<i>in a little place northeast of their camp</i>
<i>about 5 or 6 miles.</i>

1496
01:36:05,050 --> 01:36:08,471
Charlie, well, he was just
the sweetest guy on the planet.

1497
01:36:08,554 --> 01:36:10,014
I don't know how else to put it.

1498
01:36:10,097 --> 01:36:12,892
I'm sure everybody else
would have said the same thing.

1499
01:36:12,975 --> 01:36:14,768
<i>- This is it. The place where</i>
<i>they're spending most of their time.</i>

1500
01:36:14,852 --> 01:36:16,312
<i>Pretty nasty out Mac, 35 knots.</i>

1501
01:36:16,395 --> 01:36:17,646
<i>Screw it, I'm gonna go up anyway.</i>

1502
01:36:17,730 --> 01:36:20,441
Charlie was growing his own grass,
his own weed.

1503
01:36:20,524 --> 01:36:23,903
He was very proud of that.
A very well read man.

1504
01:36:23,986 --> 01:36:28,657
Very well read. Really fun to talk to.
Great debater.

1505
01:36:28,741 --> 01:36:33,037
You know when he was giving you
a statistic, it was legit.

1506
01:36:33,120 --> 01:36:37,166
God rest his soul, he uh, was always

1507
01:36:37,249 --> 01:36:39,335
bringing in reference material.

1508
01:36:39,418 --> 01:36:41,879
Stuff about the backscatter effect,

1509
01:36:41,962 --> 01:36:47,051
which is things buried deep
in the permafrost slowly,

1510
01:36:47,134 --> 01:36:51,180
for whatever reason, rise to the surface
and suddenly appear there.

1511
01:36:51,263 --> 01:36:55,100
<i>Well, the backscatter effect's</i>
<i>been bringing things up</i>

1512
01:36:55,184 --> 01:36:57,811
<i>from way down around here for a long time.</i>

1513
01:36:57,895 --> 01:37:02,775
<i>I'd say, I'd say the ice that's buried</i>
<i>in is 100,000 years old, at least.</i>

1514
01:37:02,858 --> 01:37:07,279
You know, sometimes it got to be too much,
just too much information.

1515
01:37:09,031 --> 01:37:12,243
- Charles Hallahan's Norris,
the geologist.

1516
01:37:12,326 --> 01:37:15,079
He's one of the men who go along
on the helicopter flight

1517
01:37:15,162 --> 01:37:18,582
to see where the Norwegians
found the block of ice.

1518
01:37:18,666 --> 01:37:21,544
You know, he's got a-- a--
an important place on the team.

1519
01:37:26,215 --> 01:37:29,301
John Carpenter obviously
has a great deal of affection

1520
01:37:29,385 --> 01:37:33,097
and respect for the original film
of <i>The Thing</i>.

1521
01:37:33,180 --> 01:37:34,807
<i>The Thing from Another World.</i>

1522
01:37:34,890 --> 01:37:40,229
Uh, and indeed, he references it directly
several times in his film.

1523
01:37:40,312 --> 01:37:42,523
The flying saucer at the beginning.

1524
01:37:42,606 --> 01:37:46,527
He chooses to have
a classic-looking flying saucer.

1525
01:37:46,610 --> 01:37:48,654
Very retro sci-fi.

1526
01:37:48,737 --> 01:37:50,531
ANTARCTICA

1527
01:37:50,614 --> 01:37:52,908
Well, I guess now you'd call that
an Easter egg of some sort.

1528
01:37:52,992 --> 01:37:56,328
But um, yeah, I-- I think
those were all intentional.

1529
01:38:17,016 --> 01:38:19,143
<i>-Hello, doctor, professor. -Hello.</i>

1530
01:38:19,226 --> 01:38:21,020
<i>-Still the same game? </i>
<i>-Yes.</i>

1531
01:38:36,160 --> 01:38:38,454
<i>-And then it got really fouled up.</i>
<i>-You mean you're not getting anything?</i>

1532
01:38:38,537 --> 01:38:41,165
<i>Not a thing. Static's knocking it</i>
<i>right out of the air.</i>

1533
01:38:41,248 --> 01:38:44,126
<i>Look, I haven't been able to reach shit</i>
<i>in two weeks.</i>

1534
01:38:45,544 --> 01:38:46,503
<i>Look there.</i>

1535
01:38:49,131 --> 01:38:50,424
<i>Half a mile due east.</i>

1536
01:39:03,604 --> 01:39:05,272
<i>-Captain Hendry.</i>
<i>-What's the matter, Corporal?</i>

1537
01:39:05,356 --> 01:39:07,274
<i>-Dr. Chapman. -Where's the captain?</i>

1538
01:39:07,358 --> 01:39:08,359
<i>I've got to tell him…</i>

1539
01:39:09,902 --> 01:39:11,070
<i>It's Bennings.</i>

1540
01:39:28,754 --> 01:39:31,173
- You have the helicopter flying
across a mountain range.

1541
01:39:31,256 --> 01:39:34,468
There's one kind of vein of mountains
running through it.

1542
01:39:34,551 --> 01:39:35,969
And when they give you the references,

1543
01:39:36,053 --> 01:39:38,389
I get a feeling if somebody out there
wanted to do it,

1544
01:39:38,472 --> 01:39:40,933
they could triangulate exactly
where this camp was.

1545
01:39:47,773 --> 01:39:50,192
Antarctic people might criticize it
and say,

1546
01:39:50,275 --> 01:39:52,569
"Well, we don't have mountains like
at the South Pole,

1547
01:39:52,653 --> 01:39:53,987
so it's not a South Pole station."

1548
01:39:54,071 --> 01:39:56,031
Well, it never said
it's a South Pole station.

1549
01:39:56,115 --> 01:39:58,325
And then there is a thing in the movie
that says something

1550
01:39:58,409 --> 01:40:02,037
about 800 miles away,
which is roughly the distance to McMurdo.

1551
01:40:05,916 --> 01:40:11,880
Mike Ploog, he drew this outrageously
big sombrero for Kurt.

1552
01:40:12,548 --> 01:40:14,925
And I-- I loved it. And I had it made.

1553
01:40:15,009 --> 01:40:17,469
And I don't think Kurt liked it very much.

1554
01:40:19,888 --> 01:40:22,141
- I buttonholed him in a party a year ago.

1555
01:40:22,224 --> 01:40:23,767
And I said, "I'm sorry,
I don't mean to bother you,

1556
01:40:23,851 --> 01:40:26,145
but I just can't help but talk to you
about <i>The Thing</i>."

1557
01:40:26,228 --> 01:40:27,896
And he was happy to talk about it.

1558
01:40:27,980 --> 01:40:29,565
And I said, "Let's just start.
I'll just start here.

1559
01:40:29,648 --> 01:40:31,150
Let's start with the hat."

1560
01:40:31,233 --> 01:40:33,485
And-- and he said,
"Oh, I hated that damn hat.

1561
01:40:33,569 --> 01:40:37,531
Initially, he hated the hat.
Yes. Yes, he did.

1562
01:40:38,574 --> 01:40:40,909
But then he grew fond of it.

1563
01:40:40,993 --> 01:40:42,911
And I don't know
how John talked him into it.

1564
01:40:45,789 --> 01:40:48,167
Uh. Kurt had not been cast.

1565
01:40:48,250 --> 01:40:51,003
He was about to be cast
as we went up mid-June.

1566
01:40:52,129 --> 01:40:56,383
John needed Kurt's outfit,
because he was gonna play Kurt

1567
01:40:56,467 --> 01:40:59,136
in one of the shots
we were gonna do, second unit.

1568
01:40:59,219 --> 01:41:01,847
So John picked the outfit,
including the fabulous hat that

1569
01:41:01,930 --> 01:41:03,515
uh, that Kurt loved so much.

1570
01:41:04,975 --> 01:41:07,269
And that's where John established the hat.

1571
01:41:07,352 --> 01:41:09,813
MacReady going forward,
and toward the flying saucer.

1572
01:41:11,273 --> 01:41:13,567
That's John Carpenter playing MacReady.

1573
01:41:17,613 --> 01:41:19,615
- I go to wardrobe,
and we're going through,

1574
01:41:19,698 --> 01:41:21,074
you know, this, that, and I got the thing.

1575
01:41:21,158 --> 01:41:23,869
And I keep noticing that over,
there's a chair over there

1576
01:41:23,952 --> 01:41:25,913
with this big sombrero on it.

1577
01:41:25,996 --> 01:41:27,831
I said, "What's the deal
with the sombrero?"

1578
01:41:27,915 --> 01:41:29,958
She said, "Oh, that's your hat."

1579
01:41:30,042 --> 01:41:33,170
I just laughed. I said,
"I'm not wearing a sombrero."

1580
01:41:33,253 --> 01:41:35,881
And I-- I think at that point
John kind of came in.

1581
01:41:35,964 --> 01:41:38,300
I don't know if he was out
in the hallway listening or something.

1582
01:41:38,383 --> 01:41:41,094
I don't know. He came in,
and I said, "That sombrero."

1583
01:41:41,178 --> 01:41:45,057
And he goes, "It'll be great."
And I said, "All right, if you say so.

1584
01:41:45,140 --> 01:41:47,601
I'll wear that sombrero in a helicopter.

1585
01:41:47,684 --> 01:41:49,061
Okay, fine."

1586
01:41:49,144 --> 01:41:51,355
He showed me some stuff that they'd shot.

1587
01:41:51,438 --> 01:41:54,942
You had all these guys, all,
you know, heavy clothes, wrap--

1588
01:41:55,025 --> 01:41:58,320
wrapped up, hoods, goggles.

1589
01:41:58,403 --> 01:41:59,863
And then I was looking at this,
and I said,

1590
01:41:59,947 --> 01:42:02,449
"But it looked really good.
It just looked really good."

1591
01:42:03,408 --> 01:42:04,451
And I said-- he said, "What do you think?"

1592
01:42:04,535 --> 01:42:06,745
And I said,
"I think it looks really good."

1593
01:42:06,829 --> 01:42:10,374
He said, "But you see, my issue.
I don't know who's who.

1594
01:42:10,457 --> 01:42:13,001
I need someone to hang my hat on."

1595
01:42:13,085 --> 01:42:16,547
And suddenly the sombrero,
and when I saw sombrero,

1596
01:42:16,630 --> 01:42:18,882
he lit-- he means literally a hat.

1597
01:42:23,053 --> 01:42:27,266
Says the old Ford thing, right?
"Where's the horizon?" Right?

1598
01:42:27,349 --> 01:42:28,892
It's shot like a Western.

1599
01:42:28,976 --> 01:42:31,603
When the atmosphere weighs down
the characters,

1600
01:42:31,687 --> 01:42:36,024
it's the nothingness crushing
little figures.

1601
01:42:36,108 --> 01:42:40,779
I remember he once looked at me
and he said, "Okay, so uh, Darabont,

1602
01:42:40,863 --> 01:42:42,990
-Hawks or Ford?
-Hm.

1603
01:42:43,073 --> 01:42:45,117
It's like saying, you know,
Beatles or Stones, right?

1604
01:42:45,200 --> 01:42:48,120
-Oh, yeah. Oh yeah.
-Back then I-- I said, "I think Ford."

1605
01:42:48,203 --> 01:42:50,122
And he-- and he looked at me
and he goes, "You're wrong."

1606
01:42:50,205 --> 01:42:51,164
Yeah.

1607
01:42:54,209 --> 01:42:55,752
- There's a running joke that I have
with a friend of mine

1608
01:42:55,836 --> 01:42:58,213
who-- where we-- we talk about
whatever movie Carpenter's made,

1609
01:42:58,297 --> 01:42:59,715
he's some-- at some point
in the interviews,

1610
01:42:59,798 --> 01:43:01,258
he's gonna go,
"Well, it's really a Western."

1611
01:43:08,265 --> 01:43:12,477
But certainly <i>The Thing</i>
as elements of a Western,

1612
01:43:12,561 --> 01:43:15,522
to a degree, Quentin Tarantino remade it

1613
01:43:15,606 --> 01:43:18,567
as a Western in uh, <i>The Hateful Eight</i>,

1614
01:43:18,650 --> 01:43:21,778
which is snowbound. Here's Kurt Russell.

1615
01:43:21,862 --> 01:43:24,948
I hope it's not true that
Kurt Russell's character

1616
01:43:25,032 --> 01:43:26,909
in <i>Hateful Eight</i> is an ancestor
of MacReady.

1617
01:43:26,992 --> 01:43:29,369
The fun thing about Kurt Russell
in <i>Hateful Eight</i>

1618
01:43:29,453 --> 01:43:30,662
is that he's kind of foolish.

1619
01:43:30,746 --> 01:43:33,707
He's not on top of everything
and he's not got it all figured out.

1620
01:43:33,790 --> 01:43:36,585
We are led to think he's that guy,
but he's kind of a dipshit.

1621
01:43:38,462 --> 01:43:40,047
<i>Christ, that's awful!</i>

1622
01:43:41,006 --> 01:43:45,385
And my character in
that was not paranoid enough.

1623
01:43:45,469 --> 01:43:47,429
Just because you're--
just because you're paranoid

1624
01:43:47,512 --> 01:43:49,181
doesn't mean they're not after you.

1625
01:43:52,684 --> 01:43:54,561
- My God, those beautiful matte paintings

1626
01:43:54,645 --> 01:43:57,564
when they're rappelling down
where the ship crashed.

1627
01:43:57,648 --> 01:43:58,565
It's unmatched.

1628
01:43:58,649 --> 01:44:00,943
There's-- there's nothing that looks
and feels like that.

1629
01:44:01,026 --> 01:44:04,488
When you see those beautiful,
beautiful Albert Whitlock

1630
01:44:04,571 --> 01:44:06,531
matte paintings, they're--
they're spectacular.

1631
01:44:06,615 --> 01:44:11,662
So, Carpenter really understood
the classical '50s style

1632
01:44:11,745 --> 01:44:15,332
of filmmaking,
but used modern special effects.

1633
01:44:18,335 --> 01:44:21,630
The production design, uh,
the cinematography,

1634
01:44:21,713 --> 01:44:25,759
the matte painting,
all by really talented people.

1635
01:44:25,842 --> 01:44:27,386
It makes a place.

1636
01:44:27,469 --> 01:44:33,517
It creates a setting which is real
and is also mythic.

1637
01:44:33,600 --> 01:44:36,061
The ship is right there. And it's open.

1638
01:44:36,144 --> 01:44:40,107
I find it kind of extraordinary that
they didn't even peek inside.

1639
01:44:42,359 --> 01:44:46,905
For whatever reason, it had to expand
its horizons to survive.

1640
01:44:46,989 --> 01:44:49,116
I-- I do-- you know,
who knows what that is?

1641
01:44:50,242 --> 01:44:52,869
But it came here to simply do that here.

1642
01:44:55,247 --> 01:44:59,126
- Was the Thing piloting the spacecraft

1643
01:44:59,209 --> 01:45:03,588
at the start of the film?
Or was it a passenger on board?

1644
01:45:03,672 --> 01:45:08,051
Or was it a sample uh, being carried

1645
01:45:08,135 --> 01:45:12,889
by a Weyland-Yutani type corporation

1646
01:45:12,973 --> 01:45:17,102
back to whatever planet for use
as a bioweapon or something?

1647
01:45:19,229 --> 01:45:24,109
I have always thought the creature
that was discovered

1648
01:45:24,192 --> 01:45:30,365
in the ice was one of the crew
of the crash-landed ship.

1649
01:45:30,866 --> 01:45:33,326
Uh, and that they are a race of creatures

1650
01:45:33,410 --> 01:45:39,332
that can take on the attributes
of other beings and then infiltrate.

1651
01:45:39,416 --> 01:45:42,419
I don't know. It's so confusing
when you really think about it.

1652
01:45:42,502 --> 01:45:46,465
Was it just a life form
that the actual crew

1653
01:45:46,548 --> 01:45:50,052
on the alien ship
were transporting somewhere?

1654
01:45:50,802 --> 01:45:52,220
Maybe. I don't know.

1655
01:45:55,223 --> 01:46:01,229
I thought it was like a, sort of a--
a high intelligence race in the ship.

1656
01:46:02,230 --> 01:46:05,108
And they were collectors of organism.

1657
01:46:05,192 --> 01:46:09,696
Like Darwin on the HMS Beagle.
Finding specimens.

1658
01:46:09,780 --> 01:46:13,909
Examining them. And like--
and they find this creature.

1659
01:46:13,992 --> 01:46:16,536
Maybe I don-- you know,
also shape-shifted in a-- in a--

1660
01:46:16,620 --> 01:46:19,372
in another creature. Probably.

1661
01:46:19,456 --> 01:46:22,834
And they let-- that creature
breaks loose in the ship

1662
01:46:22,918 --> 01:46:24,711
and basically kills everybody.

1663
01:46:24,795 --> 01:46:26,088
And that's why it crashes.

1664
01:46:26,171 --> 01:46:27,756
So we wanted to build all these sort

1665
01:46:27,839 --> 01:46:31,051
of glass things
with these weird creatures.

1666
01:46:31,134 --> 01:46:32,928
Like a little bit like an alien.

1667
01:46:35,722 --> 01:46:38,517
- What we were designing for the pilot

1668
01:46:38,600 --> 01:46:41,937
was an alien species unrelated
to The Thing.

1669
01:46:42,020 --> 01:46:43,772
Just like human beings are.

1670
01:46:43,855 --> 01:46:46,983
That had been taken over by The Thing.

1671
01:46:47,067 --> 01:46:52,155
And they had-- in this ship,
they had uh, various containers

1672
01:46:52,239 --> 01:46:55,325
holding different creatures
from all across the galaxy.

1673
01:46:55,951 --> 01:46:59,830
So theoretically, they picked up
a creature that was a replicant

1674
01:46:59,913 --> 01:47:02,415
or was infected by or something
of The Thing.

1675
01:47:02,499 --> 01:47:04,292
And you know, you can't contain The Thing.

1676
01:47:26,356 --> 01:47:28,984
<i>The Thing</i> was owned by Universal, so…

1677
01:47:30,527 --> 01:47:33,405
They licensed it out
and they did all sorts of things.

1678
01:47:33,488 --> 01:47:35,115
They didn't have to ask me.

1679
01:47:37,492 --> 01:47:40,287
- You basically have to do it in Norwegian

1680
01:47:40,370 --> 01:47:43,707
with an all-Norwegian male cast.
That was my proposition.

1681
01:47:43,790 --> 01:47:47,335
Now looking back on it,
I would never have done it, to be honest.

1682
01:47:52,465 --> 01:47:55,969
But it became a sort of
like reconstruction of like,

1683
01:47:56,052 --> 01:47:58,805
okay, the double-faced monster is outside.

1684
01:47:58,889 --> 01:48:01,600
How did it get outside?
There's an exit door.

1685
01:48:05,353 --> 01:48:07,647
The guy's committed suicide in his chair.

1686
01:48:10,317 --> 01:48:12,444
All these things we had to make fit.

1687
01:48:13,236 --> 01:48:15,947
And I think that had a sort of a--
it was also like a burden

1688
01:48:16,031 --> 01:48:17,449
a little bit on the story.

1689
01:48:22,871 --> 01:48:26,708
Reportedly,
a lot of very skilled people made

1690
01:48:26,791 --> 01:48:28,710
some wonderful practical effects

1691
01:48:28,793 --> 01:48:32,464
only for the studio
to obliterate them and--

1692
01:48:32,547 --> 01:48:35,508
and put computer effects in instead.

1693
01:48:35,592 --> 01:48:39,888
With the result that nothing
really looks real.

1694
01:48:39,971 --> 01:48:42,140
It looks weightless.

1695
01:48:48,271 --> 01:48:52,567
- The idea was really make it
like 80%. For real.

1696
01:48:53,360 --> 01:48:57,280
And then really do some post-work on it
to enhance stuff.

1697
01:48:57,364 --> 01:49:01,576
Because I think like in 2011,
looking at Rob Bottin's,

1698
01:49:01,660 --> 01:49:04,079
although amazing work,
if you would incorporate that

1699
01:49:04,162 --> 01:49:08,458
in a 2011 film, people would go like,
"Hmm, uh, that's a bit odd."

1700
01:49:10,794 --> 01:49:15,298
There was a-- a scene in it
where they go into a spaceship

1701
01:49:15,382 --> 01:49:19,636
and there are the frozen and dead
shriveled bodies

1702
01:49:19,719 --> 01:49:22,681
of the aliens that were on that ship.

1703
01:49:22,764 --> 01:49:27,269
It was a-- a parallel to
the Norwegian camp in the first film.

1704
01:49:27,352 --> 01:49:31,982
And we did create a character
wherein The Thing was

1705
01:49:32,065 --> 01:49:35,568
replicating itself as one of these aliens.

1706
01:49:35,652 --> 01:49:40,657
But people in the test screenings thought
that's the actual form of The Thing.

1707
01:49:40,740 --> 01:49:44,035
And so the decision was,
"Well, we can't uh, show this."

1708
01:49:45,870 --> 01:49:48,707
They basically decided that
we had to replace everything with CG.

1709
01:49:51,543 --> 01:49:54,129
- I really like what they did
with the-- the prequel.

1710
01:49:54,212 --> 01:49:59,092
The story of the Norwegian outpost

1711
01:49:59,175 --> 01:50:02,762
is already a remake,

1712
01:50:02,846 --> 01:50:06,391
in a sense, of what happened
to-- to Outpost 31.

1713
01:50:06,474 --> 01:50:11,062
You can expand the universe
by telling us what happened before,

1714
01:50:11,146 --> 01:50:15,525
but at the same time,
kind of remake the original.

1715
01:50:15,608 --> 01:50:21,740
But it's also a story that exists in
the continuity of the original film.

1716
01:50:37,630 --> 01:50:39,758
I always thought that The Thing
was sentient.

1717
01:50:39,841 --> 01:50:42,385
And that it-- it did have a plan.

1718
01:50:42,469 --> 01:50:47,265
I think it just probably landed
in the wrong airport, so to speak.

1719
01:50:47,974 --> 01:50:51,770
Well, if you examine the creature in--
in the-- in <i>The Thing</i>,

1720
01:50:51,853 --> 01:50:57,776
The Thing itself, uh,
it has one defense offense,

1721
01:50:57,859 --> 01:51:04,657
which is to hide and escape detection,
so it imitates.

1722
01:51:04,741 --> 01:51:11,122
I think The Thing is sentient in that
it has a awareness

1723
01:51:11,206 --> 01:51:17,045
of itself and an awareness of its desire
to continue existing.

1724
01:51:17,128 --> 01:51:22,675
But a lot of what it has become
is a conglomeration

1725
01:51:22,759 --> 01:51:25,512
of everything it's been.

1726
01:51:25,595 --> 01:51:28,681
It has a plan.
It is profoundly intelligent.

1727
01:51:28,765 --> 01:51:33,478
It has absorbed the-- the souls,
not only the bodies,

1728
01:51:33,561 --> 01:51:37,732
but the souls of many, many creatures
around the universe.

1729
01:51:37,816 --> 01:51:40,902
It is way smarter than all of us.

1730
01:51:42,278 --> 01:51:45,824
I always wondered if you--
you took all your cells

1731
01:51:45,907 --> 01:51:48,243
of your victim, you know,

1732
01:51:48,326 --> 01:51:51,579
would you take the sense of smell
of the dogs?

1733
01:51:51,663 --> 01:51:54,582
Would you be-- become a better smeller?

1734
01:51:54,666 --> 01:51:58,545
It's just made for a good monster movie.

1735
01:51:58,628 --> 01:52:03,216
It was all-- it all came to a--
a good-- a good head

1736
01:52:03,299 --> 01:52:08,054
to have this combination
of unanswerable stuff

1737
01:52:08,138 --> 01:52:12,016
that just makes people-- people's minds
want to explore.

1738
01:52:15,478 --> 01:52:17,647
<i>Happens all the time, man.</i>

1739
01:52:17,730 --> 01:52:19,899
<i>They're falling out of the skies</i>
<i>like flies.</i>

1740
01:52:19,983 --> 01:52:26,197
Well, I had no interest
in the genre of horror.

1741
01:52:26,281 --> 01:52:32,287
But when I read the script,
I was intrigued by the situation

1742
01:52:32,370 --> 01:52:35,498
that the men find themselves in.

1743
01:52:35,582 --> 01:52:38,793
I thought that was interesting.
Psychologically.

1744
01:52:38,877 --> 01:52:41,880
<i>Now, how's this motherfucker wake up</i>
<i>after thousands of years in the ice?</i>

1745
01:52:41,963 --> 01:52:43,381
<i>And how can it look like a dog?</i>

1746
01:52:43,465 --> 01:52:46,801
They wanted me to come in and read
for the part of Bennings.

1747
01:52:46,885 --> 01:52:52,390
I thought, "I don't want to play
another college-educated,

1748
01:52:52,474 --> 01:52:55,518
science-minded character.

1749
01:52:55,602 --> 01:53:00,773
I want to play someone
who is more working class."

1750
01:53:00,857 --> 01:53:05,528
I told my agent that I would also
like to read for Palmer.

1751
01:53:05,612 --> 01:53:10,408
Not necessarily any less smart,
but-- but less educated.

1752
01:53:10,492 --> 01:53:14,704
<i>Childs. Childs. Chariots of the Gods, man.</i>

1753
01:53:14,787 --> 01:53:16,080
- Palmer's out there.

1754
01:53:16,164 --> 01:53:18,082
You know, he's had some of the best lines.

1755
01:53:18,166 --> 01:53:19,709
He's the funniest guy.

1756
01:53:19,792 --> 01:53:21,586
Really, really, really good actor.

1757
01:53:23,213 --> 01:53:26,883
And loved doing-- he loved playing
the part he was playing.

1758
01:53:26,966 --> 01:53:28,676
He was having a lot of fun with that.

1759
01:53:30,011 --> 01:53:34,807
I became very attached to the music

1760
01:53:34,891 --> 01:53:37,227
that I wanted to hear

1761
01:53:37,310 --> 01:53:41,272
through that tape player
into the headphones.

1762
01:53:41,356 --> 01:53:43,942
It was probably The Rolling Stones.

1763
01:53:44,025 --> 01:53:48,154
You know, so I was really happy
hearing that music

1764
01:53:48,238 --> 01:53:52,242
as I went through different scenes
in the movie.

1765
01:53:52,325 --> 01:53:57,872
And then the sound mixer said,
"We have a problem.

1766
01:53:57,956 --> 01:54:02,877
We can hear The Rolling Stones coming
through your head-- your headphones."

1767
01:54:02,961 --> 01:54:05,296
And so I had to-- I had to give it up.

1768
01:54:07,048 --> 01:54:09,092
- He's kind of a good counterweight,

1769
01:54:09,175 --> 01:54:13,972
because he comes up with these
hippy-dippy conspiracy theories

1770
01:54:14,055 --> 01:54:19,852
about aliens, which makes
what people like MacReady say about

1771
01:54:19,936 --> 01:54:23,982
The Thing almost um, sensible
by comparison.

1772
01:54:24,065 --> 01:54:26,734
And he smokes a lot of weed.

1773
01:54:27,902 --> 01:54:30,947
So that's gonna give him a unique view

1774
01:54:31,030 --> 01:54:32,991
of the world around him.

1775
01:54:34,534 --> 01:54:36,160
He thinks,

1776
01:54:36,244 --> 01:54:41,666
"Yeah, so some creatures from outside

1777
01:54:41,749 --> 01:54:46,671
our world came down
and taught human beings

1778
01:54:46,754 --> 01:54:52,885
how to uh, feed themselves,
how to grow crops, uh,

1779
01:54:52,969 --> 01:54:54,554
how to raise animals."

1780
01:54:54,637 --> 01:54:57,640
<i>I just cannot believe</i>
<i>any of this voodoo bullshit.</i>

1781
01:54:57,724 --> 01:54:59,309
He has the answer.

1782
01:54:59,392 --> 01:55:00,893
<i>Chariots of the Gods</i>.

1783
01:55:00,977 --> 01:55:03,313
<i>They practically own South America.</i>

1784
01:55:03,396 --> 01:55:05,398
<i>I mean, they taught the Incas</i>
<i>everything they know.</i>

1785
01:55:05,481 --> 01:55:08,693
The '70s was a boon time
for UFO sightings.

1786
01:55:08,776 --> 01:55:10,737
And capitalizing on UFO sightings,

1787
01:55:10,820 --> 01:55:13,656
there were books, there were movies,
there were TV shows, <i>In Search Of</i>…

1788
01:55:13,740 --> 01:55:17,535
There was a movie where like,
James Earl Jones played a-- a man

1789
01:55:17,619 --> 01:55:18,661
who claimed he was abducted.

1790
01:55:18,745 --> 01:55:20,371
<i>His eyes are slanted.</i>

1791
01:55:22,373 --> 01:55:23,833
<i>Oh.</i>

1792
01:55:23,916 --> 01:55:26,377
<i>- Chariots of the Gods</i>
was a book about a popular theory

1793
01:55:26,461 --> 01:55:31,215
that human beings basically exist,
because of aliens kind of

1794
01:55:31,299 --> 01:55:34,093
settling this planet and building
the-- the pyramids

1795
01:55:34,177 --> 01:55:37,263
and the Aztec temples,
they are our gods, in a sense.

1796
01:55:38,222 --> 01:55:40,850
Interestingly, this is sort of
where <i>Prometheus</i> ended up

1797
01:55:40,933 --> 01:55:44,187
being about 'cause Ridley Scott,
you know, came up of-- of age

1798
01:55:44,270 --> 01:55:46,356
in the '70s
when we believed all that shit.

1799
01:55:49,859 --> 01:55:54,197
Now someone,
maybe Richard Masur would say,

1800
01:55:54,280 --> 01:56:00,870
"Well, when Palmer is talking about
the <i>Chariots of the Gods</i>,

1801
01:56:00,953 --> 01:56:03,790
is he already The Thing?

1802
01:56:05,625 --> 01:56:10,380
And he's doing this <i>Chariots of the Gods</i>
thing to distract them."

1803
01:56:10,463 --> 01:56:12,173
<i>You buy any of this, Blair?</i>

1804
01:56:51,504 --> 01:56:54,048
- I had to struggle with this movie,

1805
01:56:54,132 --> 01:56:57,510
because I had to embrace the darkness.

1806
01:56:57,593 --> 01:57:00,263
Because it's end-of-the-world stuff.

1807
01:57:00,346 --> 01:57:05,560
And I had gotten into it more or less
thinking I was gonna make

1808
01:57:05,643 --> 01:57:10,189
a-- hopefully, a good monster movie,
science-fiction movie.

1809
01:57:10,273 --> 01:57:14,068
And man, it's-- it's grim.

1810
01:57:14,152 --> 01:57:16,112
And you have to embrace that.

1811
01:57:19,115 --> 01:57:21,075
- Even the way
they do the computer simulation,

1812
01:57:21,159 --> 01:57:22,785
you know, all mankind wiped out.

1813
01:57:22,869 --> 01:57:26,289
That none of them are gonna make it.
It's now just about stopping that thing.

1814
01:57:29,667 --> 01:57:32,128
- Other movies, especially of that time,

1815
01:57:32,211 --> 01:57:35,548
would have had the scientists going
like, "This is the--

1816
01:57:35,631 --> 01:57:38,885
the alien cell, and this is what it does",

1817
01:57:38,968 --> 01:57:41,053
and the whole explanation.

1818
01:57:41,137 --> 01:57:45,266
And this movie does it quietly
with just text on a screen.

1819
01:57:46,809 --> 01:57:49,479
For me, it was this sort of
bleakness that was

1820
01:57:49,562 --> 01:57:51,564
a real sign of the times.

1821
01:57:51,647 --> 01:57:54,859
It was basically no hope. Huh?

1822
01:57:57,445 --> 01:58:00,573
- The choice if you read Bill's script,
Bill Lancaster's original script,

1823
01:58:00,656 --> 01:58:03,659
you would see it was more
of a movie-movie. More humor.

1824
01:58:05,161 --> 01:58:07,622
John transformed the film
and sent it toward--

1825
01:58:07,705 --> 01:58:09,040
hurling toward the apocalypse.

1826
01:58:10,875 --> 01:58:14,629
You don't really get to see the creature

1827
01:58:14,712 --> 01:58:18,674
as the creature would be when it crawled
out of that spaceship.

1828
01:58:20,218 --> 01:58:23,513
You do get to see it
on that computer screen,

1829
01:58:23,596 --> 01:58:30,228
but that is a graphic of what happens
on the cellular level.

1830
01:58:33,689 --> 01:58:36,526
- You know, this was actually
the computer.

1831
01:58:36,609 --> 01:58:39,111
And I can remember there were,
we had a bunch of tests,

1832
01:58:39,195 --> 01:58:41,072
because the frame rates and this and that,

1833
01:58:41,155 --> 01:58:43,658
and all the crap that goes with it
to make that work.

1834
01:58:46,661 --> 01:58:48,913
- There is a little in-joke there,
which is, you know,

1835
01:58:48,996 --> 01:58:51,082
John Carpenter, big Asteroids fan.

1836
01:58:51,165 --> 01:58:53,584
And when you look at the blood scene
with Blair,

1837
01:58:53,668 --> 01:58:55,795
there's a scene where you can see
the cells kind of

1838
01:58:55,878 --> 01:59:00,049
taking each other over,
which very much hints back to Asteroids.

1839
01:59:02,593 --> 01:59:07,306
Actually on the set of <i>The Thing</i>,
there was a Asteroids game.

1840
01:59:09,141 --> 01:59:12,061
And so we would play that.
It's-- it's a console deal.

1841
01:59:13,688 --> 01:59:16,440
But I personally think
there might also be another little

1842
01:59:16,524 --> 01:59:20,152
history bit here, going back to 1951.

1843
01:59:20,236 --> 01:59:22,738
Remember, John Carpenter
is trying to fill this film

1844
01:59:22,822 --> 01:59:25,116
with lots of little nods
to the original movie.

1845
01:59:25,199 --> 01:59:29,620
You get a lot of <i>Thing</i> merchandise,
including a pinball machine.

1846
01:59:29,704 --> 01:59:33,958
Maybe this little nod of having
the pinball machines there

1847
01:59:34,041 --> 01:59:36,711
to go back to this 1951 version
of <i>The Thing</i>.

1848
01:59:39,797 --> 01:59:42,008
<i>-I have to talk to you.</i>
<i>-I'm tired of talking, Fuchs.</i>

1849
01:59:42,091 --> 01:59:43,718
<i>I just want to get up to my shack</i>
<i>and get drunk.</i>

1850
01:59:43,801 --> 01:59:45,428
<i>Mac, it's important.</i>

1851
01:59:45,511 --> 01:59:48,639
I went to USC,
University of Southern California.

1852
01:59:48,723 --> 01:59:51,642
And that's where John studied film.

1853
01:59:51,726 --> 01:59:55,187
So when I went to meet him,
that was serendipitous.

1854
01:59:55,271 --> 01:59:57,982
He and I got along like gangbusters.

1855
01:59:58,065 --> 02:00:00,860
I did the first audition.
Then I came back and read again.

1856
02:00:01,652 --> 02:00:04,113
That when I left, I went,
"Oh God, I blew it.

1857
02:00:04,196 --> 02:00:05,281
I'm not gonna get that mov--

1858
02:00:05,323 --> 02:00:07,867
Oh, man, I really wanted to do
that movie."

1859
02:00:08,993 --> 02:00:13,080
And I remember walking back
across Central Park to my apartment

1860
02:00:13,164 --> 02:00:14,415
and being so dejected.

1861
02:00:14,498 --> 02:00:18,002
And I think by the time I got there,
the phone rang.

1862
02:00:18,085 --> 02:00:19,921
And they told me I booked the film.

1863
02:00:21,923 --> 02:00:24,133
<i>-Outside.</i>
<i>-It's 40 below outside.</i>

1864
02:00:24,216 --> 02:00:26,969
<i>In the Thiokol. Please, Mac.</i>

1865
02:00:27,053 --> 02:00:30,014
He reminded me a bit of Richard Dreyfuss
in <i>Jaws</i>.

1866
02:00:30,097 --> 02:00:34,101
He's a guy who comes along
with a beard and glasses,

1867
02:00:34,185 --> 02:00:35,603
a bit of an intellectual.

1868
02:00:35,686 --> 02:00:41,400
He's some sort of scientist, a geologist
or biologist, I think.

1869
02:00:41,484 --> 02:00:45,571
And he actually has a good grasp
of what's going on.

1870
02:00:45,655 --> 02:00:47,365
<i>There's something wrong with Blair.</i>

1871
02:00:47,448 --> 02:00:49,992
<i>He's locked himself in his room</i>
<i>and he won't answer the door.</i>

1872
02:00:50,785 --> 02:00:52,870
<i>So I took one of his notebooks</i>
<i>from the lab.</i>

1873
02:00:52,954 --> 02:00:53,663
<i>Yeah.</i>

1874
02:00:53,746 --> 02:00:55,331
I always thought Joel Polis is

1875
02:00:55,414 --> 02:00:58,376
when-- when-- when I was walking down
a hallway and I look in

1876
02:00:58,459 --> 02:01:01,879
and see him, it's uh, like, "What?
Wait a minute, what's going on here?"

1877
02:01:01,963 --> 02:01:03,923
And Joel was perfect in that scene

1878
02:01:04,006 --> 02:01:07,093
where he turns around
and he was so paranoid.

1879
02:01:07,176 --> 02:01:10,096
There-- there's nothing left
but paranoia on him.

1880
02:01:11,806 --> 02:01:16,018
- He kind of plays a bit of a woman
in peril role at one point.

1881
02:01:16,102 --> 02:01:18,396
He's alone in the lab
and the lights go out

1882
02:01:18,479 --> 02:01:22,650
and he's going around like a woman
wandering through a haunted house.

1883
02:01:24,568 --> 02:01:26,362
I went down to Baruch College in New York

1884
02:01:26,445 --> 02:01:31,450
and I took a biology class and I was
doing dissections of, you know, I was--

1885
02:01:31,534 --> 02:01:34,829
I always loved biology,
but I wanted to back myself up.

1886
02:01:36,163 --> 02:01:37,623
And if you read the original script,

1887
02:01:37,707 --> 02:01:43,337
it says, "Assistant biologist,
intelligent, unassuming".

1888
02:01:43,421 --> 02:01:45,464
So, yeah, I had a backstory.

1889
02:01:45,548 --> 02:01:50,219
Just doing a grant for graduate work,
uh, applying

1890
02:01:50,302 --> 02:01:53,889
to work in Antarctica
and that kind of thing.

1891
02:01:53,973 --> 02:01:57,893
Girlfriend at home.
Not gonna see her again, you know.

1892
02:02:00,563 --> 02:02:02,273
<i>Who's that?</i>

1893
02:02:13,284 --> 02:02:19,165
Well, <i>The Thing</i> involves a--
an alien species from outer space.

1894
02:02:19,248 --> 02:02:22,168
It's buried in the ice
for thousands of years.

1895
02:02:22,251 --> 02:02:26,505
That classifies <i>The Thing</i>
as definitely science-fiction.

1896
02:02:27,256 --> 02:02:29,508
<i>Thing</i> is definitely a horror movie.

1897
02:02:29,592 --> 02:02:35,389
The sci-fi element is really only
in the genesis of the threat.

1898
02:02:36,432 --> 02:02:38,517
It's definitely psychological horror.

1899
02:02:41,187 --> 02:02:45,191
I always thought that <i>The Thing</i>
was science-fiction.

1900
02:02:45,274 --> 02:02:48,736
You know,
it's got some horror elements to it.

1901
02:02:48,819 --> 02:02:52,865
I think it's a combination of horror,
uh science-fiction,

1902
02:02:52,948 --> 02:02:55,826
and psychological thriller, I think.

1903
02:02:57,620 --> 02:03:00,039
I classify it
as a science-fiction thriller.

1904
02:03:00,122 --> 02:03:02,500
It has this little sprinkle of comedy
here and there.

1905
02:03:03,709 --> 02:03:05,461
But I just don't think
it's a horror film as much

1906
02:03:05,544 --> 02:03:10,049
as it is the human-mankind survival.

1907
02:03:10,132 --> 02:03:12,885
"How do we get out of this",
kind of movie.

1908
02:03:14,970 --> 02:03:19,016
I would say it's an intellectual man's
horror film.

1909
02:03:21,519 --> 02:03:23,312
It's a sci-fi horror film.

1910
02:03:23,395 --> 02:03:28,442
And I will argue with anyone who disagrees
with me, including John Carpenter.

1911
02:03:28,526 --> 02:03:30,486
You made a sci-fi horror film, John.

1912
02:03:38,702 --> 02:03:42,581
And I think a lot of rewriting
took place between

1913
02:03:42,665 --> 02:03:48,587
the end of production on the soundstage
at Universal

1914
02:03:48,671 --> 02:03:54,176
and the beginning of production
in British Columbia, Alaska.

1915
02:03:55,845 --> 02:03:59,890
John went and watched
a rough assemblage of everything

1916
02:03:59,974 --> 02:04:02,726
we'd already shot,
so all the interior stuff.

1917
02:04:05,187 --> 02:04:06,939
And John looked at it and he said,

1918
02:04:07,022 --> 02:04:10,151
"This is a boring movie about a bunch
of guys sitting around talking."

1919
02:04:10,234 --> 02:04:16,198
And-- and it was a bunch of guys
sitting around talking.

1920
02:04:17,908 --> 02:04:19,702
<i>- We ought to just burn these things.</i>

1921
02:04:19,785 --> 02:04:22,371
<i>Can't burn the find of the century.</i>

1922
02:04:22,454 --> 02:04:24,874
- So they were shooting
and I was cutting right along.

1923
02:04:24,957 --> 02:04:27,793
And then suddenly,
I got this interpretation of how

1924
02:04:27,877 --> 02:04:31,964
<i>The Thing</i> might work that
uh, was different

1925
02:04:32,047 --> 02:04:35,009
from what we might
want to be communicating.

1926
02:04:35,092 --> 02:04:38,721
And uh, so John came down
and I discussed it with him.

1927
02:04:38,804 --> 02:04:40,764
"I think we might have
a potential problem here

1928
02:04:40,848 --> 02:04:44,185
where some people are gonna think this
because uh, it occurred to me."

1929
02:04:48,272 --> 02:04:52,902
After the nine weeks on stage,
when John looked at the cut,

1930
02:04:52,985 --> 02:04:54,570
you know, and-- and came to my office,

1931
02:04:54,653 --> 02:04:58,157
and you know, and said uh,
"It doesn't work.

1932
02:04:59,283 --> 02:05:01,410
Long boring, pe-- repetitive.

1933
02:05:01,493 --> 02:05:03,746
It's a long time between monsters."

1934
02:05:06,040 --> 02:05:10,002
I tinkered with the script right up
until the end, to be frank,

1935
02:05:10,085 --> 02:05:13,547
because uh, I just, it has--
the movie has to work.

1936
02:05:15,507 --> 02:05:16,926
- The studio loved the dailies.

1937
02:05:17,009 --> 02:05:19,136
They were seeing all the stuff
of the men on stage.

1938
02:05:19,220 --> 02:05:21,138
We held back all the creature stuff
from them.

1939
02:05:21,222 --> 02:05:23,015
They liked what they were seeing.

1940
02:05:23,098 --> 02:05:27,061
And it's all of a sudden, John Carpenter
is saying uh, "Yeah, it doesn't work."

1941
02:05:27,144 --> 02:05:29,355
<i>Sorry, Mac. You have to move your stuff…</i>

1942
02:05:30,814 --> 02:05:34,526
But I thought we needed to hit the idea
and the themes harder.

1943
02:05:37,112 --> 02:05:39,657
- Scenes were just starting to get left
in cold cloth.

1944
02:05:39,740 --> 02:05:41,742
Uh, other scenes were repositioned.

1945
02:05:41,825 --> 02:05:46,080
Other scenes were sort of remade
into something else,

1946
02:05:46,163 --> 02:05:49,208
um, where the meaning--
where their meaning was changed.

1947
02:05:49,291 --> 02:05:52,253
The computer graphic, the player watches,
you know, is a new scene,

1948
02:05:52,336 --> 02:05:54,588
for example, that was remade
out of something else.

1949
02:05:56,298 --> 02:05:58,175
Uh, it was John really doing violence.

1950
02:05:58,259 --> 02:05:59,677
But he was out ruthless with it.

1951
02:05:59,760 --> 02:06:01,720
And he knew he'd have to replace it
with, you know,

1952
02:06:01,804 --> 02:06:04,473
material that he would write
and that he would have to shoot.

1953
02:06:04,556 --> 02:06:09,019
Not on the relatively cozy confines
of the Universal lot,

1954
02:06:09,103 --> 02:06:11,480
but in the most hostile environment
imaginable

1955
02:06:11,563 --> 02:06:14,733
on top of the world, you know,
Stewart, British Columbia.

1956
02:06:16,277 --> 02:06:18,279
<i>Let's go, Bennings.</i>
<i>I gotta get some sleep.</i>

1957
02:06:52,938 --> 02:06:59,862
John, he took us each one by one
into his trailer in L.A. before--

1958
02:06:59,945 --> 02:07:02,156
just before we had day one,

1959
02:07:02,239 --> 02:07:06,869
to ask us if there was anything
before we start shooting

1960
02:07:06,952 --> 02:07:09,788
that we had not explored
or if they had any questions

1961
02:07:09,872 --> 02:07:12,583
whatsoever about the process or anything.

1962
02:07:12,666 --> 02:07:16,086
And I told him I didn't have
any complaints except that I wish

1963
02:07:16,170 --> 02:07:19,673
I wasn't the one to be killed first.

1964
02:07:19,757 --> 02:07:24,720
And he said, "Peter, 10 out of 12 men
are going to be killed

1965
02:07:24,803 --> 02:07:29,058
in awful ways. Somebody
has to be the first."

1966
02:07:30,726 --> 02:07:33,937
<i>Oh, shit.</i>

1967
02:07:34,021 --> 02:07:37,858
Bennings' transformation is
is the first time we've seen

1968
02:07:37,941 --> 02:07:42,863
the uh, <i>The Thing</i> kind of
manifesting itself in a human body.

1969
02:07:44,531 --> 02:07:47,201
It's like running in
on your parents having sex.

1970
02:07:49,495 --> 02:07:53,040
- We're messing with brand-new chemicals
for the tentacles.

1971
02:07:53,123 --> 02:07:57,920
Those were a thing called, "Smooth-On",
material called, "Smooth-On".

1972
02:07:58,003 --> 02:08:00,255
And Smooth-On, which not many people like

1973
02:08:00,339 --> 02:08:03,467
to mess with anymore,
but at the time, Rob was like,

1974
02:08:03,550 --> 02:08:08,055
"Oh, we can make the tentacles out of that
and make 'em really stretchy."

1975
02:08:10,182 --> 02:08:13,769
<i>Bennings was right there, Mac!</i>
<i>I swear to God, it had a hold of him!</i>

1976
02:08:13,852 --> 02:08:17,356
When my death came,
I mean, it was my third death.

1977
02:08:17,439 --> 02:08:20,234
There were three deaths
of George Bennings.

1978
02:08:24,363 --> 02:08:27,491
There are instances in this movie
where you still had to fall back

1979
02:08:27,574 --> 02:08:30,828
on the lessons you learned as--
as an independent director,

1980
02:08:30,911 --> 02:08:33,914
things you had to do for no money
or little money.

1981
02:08:33,997 --> 02:08:40,212
And uh, no better example of this than--
than the transformation of Bennings.

1982
02:08:40,295 --> 02:08:43,215
The first one was written
by Bill Lancaster.

1983
02:08:45,217 --> 02:08:48,720
In that, I escape on a snowmobile.

1984
02:08:50,389 --> 02:08:52,975
- One of the best scenes in the script,
after the kennel,

1985
02:08:53,058 --> 02:08:54,435
some of the dogs escaped,

1986
02:08:54,518 --> 02:08:57,646
and the men chase after them
on snowmobiles

1987
02:08:57,729 --> 02:09:00,023
and eventually, come across a dog.

1988
02:09:00,107 --> 02:09:03,360
And I suggested doing this at night
and having us all lit by headlights.

1989
02:09:03,444 --> 02:09:05,279
It was a nightmarish scene.

1990
02:09:05,362 --> 02:09:08,031
The dogs were gonna turn
and change into you know,

1991
02:09:08,115 --> 02:09:09,575
this monster dog

1992
02:09:09,658 --> 02:09:11,326
and it was gonna start
this huge chain of events

1993
02:09:11,410 --> 02:09:13,579
where tentacles were gonna start appearing

1994
02:09:13,662 --> 02:09:16,665
from underneath the snow,
pulling snowmobiles down.

1995
02:09:16,748 --> 02:09:20,169
One of them pulls Bennings down,
the character down,

1996
02:09:20,252 --> 02:09:21,879
and it's just hell to pay.

1997
02:09:23,922 --> 02:09:27,342
Now the set was gonna be a giant L
on stage 12

1998
02:09:27,426 --> 02:09:30,179
and cantilevered, so we could do effects
underneath and out

1999
02:09:30,262 --> 02:09:32,681
from the side of the wall, including fire.

2000
02:09:33,807 --> 02:09:36,435
I mean, terrific scene.
Everybody loved it.

2001
02:09:38,687 --> 02:09:40,189
Oh, we couldn't afford the scene.

2002
02:09:44,860 --> 02:09:45,903
<i>Clark?</i>

2003
02:09:48,322 --> 02:09:52,618
So we had the new death of Bennings,
which we shot,

2004
02:09:52,701 --> 02:09:57,080
of me being killed by <i>The Thing</i>
in a human form.

2005
02:09:57,164 --> 02:09:59,875
That was a hard day's shoot.

2006
02:10:07,090 --> 02:10:09,259
And I'm transfixed by the dogs.

2007
02:10:09,343 --> 02:10:14,181
The door opens at the end of the hall
and a figure slowly walks towards me.

2008
02:10:14,264 --> 02:10:19,394
And I don't see it, because I'm--
I'm trapped here with awful wonder.

2009
02:10:21,772 --> 02:10:25,400
And he comes up behind me,
wraps a barbed wire garrote

2010
02:10:25,484 --> 02:10:30,739
around my throat, pulls it tight,
pushes the screwdriver in,

2011
02:10:30,822 --> 02:10:35,536
rips the chain-link fence, hoists me up,
and hangs me over.

2012
02:10:35,619 --> 02:10:37,079
That's the end of Bennings.

2013
02:10:38,330 --> 02:10:43,377
Why would <i>The Thing</i>,
having taken over one of the bodies

2014
02:10:43,460 --> 02:10:46,296
here in the camp, feel the need

2015
02:10:46,380 --> 02:10:50,759
to put a ski mask over his face?
It's not truthful.

2016
02:10:50,842 --> 02:10:54,972
The only reason that the mask exists is
so the audience

2017
02:10:55,055 --> 02:10:57,182
won't know who it is.

2018
02:10:58,600 --> 02:11:00,352
<i>Get back! Stay back!</i>

2019
02:11:04,189 --> 02:11:05,691
<i>It isn't Bennings!</i>

2020
02:11:05,774 --> 02:11:09,319
Those hands, that you see,
are a used pair of hands

2021
02:11:09,403 --> 02:11:12,781
that we had used prev--
you know, four or five months earlier.

2022
02:11:12,864 --> 02:11:16,868
They're the hands that Palmer uses
in his flight to the ceiling.

2023
02:11:18,203 --> 02:11:20,998
This is a situation
where every cell in your body

2024
02:11:21,081 --> 02:11:25,335
has been changed maybe in a couple hours.

2025
02:11:25,419 --> 02:11:31,216
And what exists is still a person
who looks like you

2026
02:11:31,300 --> 02:11:34,052
and exists in the exact same
physical space as you,

2027
02:11:34,136 --> 02:11:36,221
but every single cell of your body
has been changed

2028
02:11:36,305 --> 02:11:38,974
into this alien, which is now
what you are.

2029
02:11:39,057 --> 02:11:44,313
So at some point, you have died
in this transformation.

2030
02:11:44,396 --> 02:11:49,776
Whatever was you is gone, and <i>The Thing</i>
is now impersonating you.

2031
02:11:52,321 --> 02:11:54,906
- Rob set up a pair
of insulating tentacles

2032
02:11:54,990 --> 02:11:58,952
and some orange K-Y Jelly
um, and the pair of hands.

2033
02:11:59,036 --> 02:12:02,748
Nobody from the effects team
was up there. You know?

2034
02:12:02,831 --> 02:12:05,334
And John made this scene work.

2035
02:12:05,417 --> 02:12:09,463
And this scene is, you know,
man turning into monster.

2036
02:12:09,546 --> 02:12:10,797
That's all John.

2037
02:12:13,300 --> 02:12:17,471
My best friends are forming
a circle around me,

2038
02:12:17,554 --> 02:12:19,014
and this terrible thing is happening to me

2039
02:12:19,097 --> 02:12:23,644
and the evidence is here in my hands
or my arms or whatever they are.

2040
02:12:25,062 --> 02:12:26,647
It's like something
out of Philip Kaufman's

2041
02:12:26,730 --> 02:12:28,482
<i>Invasion of the Body Snatchers</i>.

2042
02:12:28,565 --> 02:12:31,151
It's so scary, because you see his breath,

2043
02:12:31,234 --> 02:12:34,112
you see the look in his eyes,
and it's just a hand.

2044
02:12:34,196 --> 02:12:35,364
And we're like, "Oh, we caught you

2045
02:12:35,447 --> 02:12:38,367
at the first 30 seconds
of your transformation."

2046
02:12:38,450 --> 02:12:40,369
Then he lets out that alien scream,

2047
02:12:40,452 --> 02:12:45,832
which is a really good sound effect.
It's unearthly.

2048
02:12:50,921 --> 02:12:55,217
But that sound is one of my favorite,
favorite sound effects in in movies.

2049
02:13:00,931 --> 02:13:02,224
- I think I torched him.
Didn't I burn him?

2050
02:13:02,307 --> 02:13:03,975
I mean, I torched him. He was great.

2051
02:13:05,352 --> 02:13:07,312
Everybody did their thing, man.

2052
02:13:14,444 --> 02:13:16,905
It also, I think, gives rise
to one of the film's

2053
02:13:16,988 --> 02:13:21,618
most touching moments where I think
it's Garry says to MacReady…

2054
02:13:21,702 --> 02:13:24,705
<i>MacReady, I know Bennings.</i>
<i>I've known him for 10 years.</i>

2055
02:13:24,788 --> 02:13:26,081
<i>He's my friend.</i>

2056
02:13:26,164 --> 02:13:28,125
And it's a reminder that, you know,

2057
02:13:28,208 --> 02:13:31,753
these people turning into things
were people and you know,

2058
02:13:31,837 --> 02:13:33,088
they had relationships.

2059
02:13:34,589 --> 02:13:39,177
Donald Moffat as Garry,
he's like a company man.

2060
02:13:39,261 --> 02:13:42,222
I mean, I don't know
how he ended up in the Antarctic,

2061
02:13:42,264 --> 02:13:45,100
in charge of this weird group of men.

2062
02:13:45,183 --> 02:13:47,561
It becomes obvious as-- as everyone--

2063
02:13:47,686 --> 02:13:51,440
as the shit hits the fan
that he's not up to it.

2064
02:13:53,358 --> 02:13:59,656
Donald was older than any of us
and very patrician person.

2065
02:13:59,740 --> 02:14:03,410
And he played presidents
of the United States.

2066
02:14:03,493 --> 02:14:06,246
<i>I am the president of the United States.</i>

2067
02:14:06,329 --> 02:14:12,335
He never succumbed to the lure
of this science-fiction masterpiece.

2068
02:14:12,419 --> 02:14:13,628
He just never did.

2069
02:14:13,712 --> 02:14:15,505
<i>Who else could've used that key?</i>

2070
02:14:15,589 --> 02:14:19,050
<i>Nobody. I just give it to Copper</i>
<i>whenever he needs it.</i>

2071
02:14:19,134 --> 02:14:22,387
Donald, I-- I never got to know
all that well.

2072
02:14:22,471 --> 02:14:24,890
Donald was a little-- for me anyway,

2073
02:14:24,973 --> 02:14:27,809
he was a little hard to get to know.
Not that he was distant.

2074
02:14:27,893 --> 02:14:30,896
He was just kind of unto himself, I guess.

2075
02:14:32,314 --> 02:14:34,274
Donald Moffat was
one of my favorite actors.

2076
02:14:34,357 --> 02:14:36,818
I had-- Donald and I had worked
on a television series together,

2077
02:14:36,902 --> 02:14:40,197
<i>The New Land.</i>
He's just a great actor.

2078
02:14:40,280 --> 02:14:42,908
So I was excited about working
with him again.

2079
02:14:42,991 --> 02:14:45,786
And he goes from, you know,
being the sheriff to the--

2080
02:14:45,869 --> 02:14:47,621
at the end of the--
my favorite thing at the end

2081
02:14:47,704 --> 02:14:50,123
of the movie he says,
"What do we do, MacReady?

2082
02:14:50,207 --> 02:14:51,082
What do we do?"

2083
02:14:51,166 --> 02:14:53,543
<i>What can we do? What can we do?</i>

2084
02:14:53,627 --> 02:14:56,713
We get a sense that
he's a little bit of the odd man out

2085
02:14:56,797 --> 02:14:58,715
in the uh, in the group.

2086
02:15:00,008 --> 02:15:02,719
To see him deal with that
and then to see him

2087
02:15:02,803 --> 02:15:07,474
lose leadership when uh,
MacReady rises is just terrific.

2088
02:15:07,557 --> 02:15:09,684
And Donald Moffat plays that perfectly.

2089
02:15:09,768 --> 02:15:11,937
And I guess,
you'll all feel a little easier…

2090
02:15:14,648 --> 02:15:16,817
if somebody else was in charge.

2091
02:15:16,900 --> 02:15:19,986
And there's a dynamic that John emphasized

2092
02:15:20,070 --> 02:15:22,739
when he rewrote the second act.

2093
02:15:22,823 --> 02:15:25,116
Originally, MacReady came out of the pack,

2094
02:15:25,200 --> 02:15:27,244
was a lot more reluctant.

2095
02:15:27,327 --> 02:15:29,830
John, for story purposes, really,
being a character

2096
02:15:29,913 --> 02:15:34,376
to drive the action, to move MacReady
front and center in command, in charge.

2097
02:15:34,459 --> 02:15:37,170
<i>We gotta burn the rest of 'em.</i>

2098
02:15:37,254 --> 02:15:39,798
- MacReady.
He's trying to save his own ass.

2099
02:15:39,881 --> 02:15:42,133
And the only way to save his own ass is

2100
02:15:42,217 --> 02:15:45,262
to save everybody else
who isn't The Thing.

2101
02:15:48,723 --> 02:15:51,768
More than leadership,
it's about independence.

2102
02:15:51,852 --> 02:15:54,604
You know, Kurt Russell's character
of MacReady is not

2103
02:15:54,688 --> 02:15:58,066
listening to anybody else.
He's gonna do it his way.

2104
02:15:58,900 --> 02:16:00,151
<i>All right, step back.</i>

2105
02:16:01,695 --> 02:16:05,115
It's a wonderful dramatization
of what I call, "authenticity".

2106
02:16:05,198 --> 02:16:08,201
And it's what natural leaders
have about them.

2107
02:16:08,285 --> 02:16:12,122
So as you see the original
uh, authority figure

2108
02:16:12,205 --> 02:16:15,500
in the group lose credibility
when shit starts to happen

2109
02:16:15,584 --> 02:16:18,128
nobody can explain, MacReady has the balls

2110
02:16:18,211 --> 02:16:20,922
to step up and take charge
of the situation.

2111
02:16:27,888 --> 02:16:30,599
I think MacReady taking charge
is sort of a foregone conclusion

2112
02:16:30,682 --> 02:16:33,184
just based on how the film is cast.

2113
02:16:33,268 --> 02:16:35,020
We know who the star of this movie is

2114
02:16:35,103 --> 02:16:37,105
and we know who's gonna be running
the show eventually.

2115
02:16:37,189 --> 02:16:40,650
And I think there's a lot of pleasure
on Carpenter's end

2116
02:16:40,734 --> 02:16:43,403
in the storytelling idea
of this sort of like

2117
02:16:43,486 --> 02:16:45,530
lone wolf pilot who stays up

2118
02:16:45,614 --> 02:16:50,243
in his cabin by himself uh,
having to lead the group.

2119
02:16:50,327 --> 02:16:51,912
<i>You sure that's all of 'em?</i>

2120
02:16:51,995 --> 02:16:53,914
<i>We cleaned out the storehouse, the lab.</i>

2121
02:16:53,997 --> 02:16:55,832
<i>There is nothing left.</i>

2122
02:16:55,916 --> 02:16:58,209
The pecking order was a real thing.

2123
02:16:58,293 --> 02:16:59,878
It was just-- it just-- it just was.

2124
02:16:59,961 --> 02:17:04,674
Everybody fell into who their roles were.
That's all I can say.

2125
02:17:05,884 --> 02:17:10,055
I think the other interesting
leadership theme about <i>The Thing</i>

2126
02:17:10,138 --> 02:17:12,807
is that it's sort of parallel
to something that happened

2127
02:17:12,891 --> 02:17:17,812
in another movie that year, <i>Wrath of Khan</i>,
which is about a no-win scenario.

2128
02:17:17,896 --> 02:17:20,231
And how do you perform
in a no-win scenario?

2129
02:17:21,608 --> 02:17:23,693
There's a scene near the end of the film
where Kurt Russell

2130
02:17:23,777 --> 02:17:25,320
tells the guys that are left,

2131
02:17:25,403 --> 02:17:27,447
"None of us are getting out
of this alive."

2132
02:17:29,157 --> 02:17:30,909
<i>- We're not getting out of here alive.</i>

2133
02:17:32,160 --> 02:17:36,331
And it takes something
to sort of admit that, to tell--

2134
02:17:36,414 --> 02:17:40,835
tell your-- your fellow men that
and to act on that in a way that

2135
02:17:40,919 --> 02:17:44,005
is uh, for the common good.

2136
02:17:44,923 --> 02:17:46,174
<i>You understand me?</i>

2137
02:17:46,257 --> 02:17:48,301
<i>-He's got a gun. Get back.</i>
<i>-Anybody interferes, I'll kill 'em.</i>

2138
02:17:48,385 --> 02:17:50,553
<i>-Jesus. -Just leave it here.</i>

2139
02:17:50,637 --> 02:17:53,098
Blair, he's the guy who goes crazy

2140
02:17:53,181 --> 02:17:55,141
and starts destroying
all the camp's equipment,

2141
02:17:55,225 --> 02:17:56,726
especially the radio.

2142
02:17:57,686 --> 02:18:01,231
<i>Do you think that thing wanted</i>
<i>to be an animal?</i>

2143
02:18:01,314 --> 02:18:04,317
<i>No dogs make it a thousand miles</i>
<i>through the cold.</i>

2144
02:18:04,401 --> 02:18:08,238
I have a theory that's when
he knows he is The Thing.

2145
02:18:10,865 --> 02:18:14,452
The big question among the crew
when we were-- we did two weeks

2146
02:18:14,536 --> 02:18:17,747
of rehearsal, was-- the question was,

2147
02:18:17,831 --> 02:18:21,710
"Would you know if you were a Thing?"
And we could--

2148
02:18:21,793 --> 02:18:23,336
Nobody could answer that.

2149
02:18:23,420 --> 02:18:26,798
<i>- Nobody gets in and out of here! Nobody!</i>

2150
02:18:28,800 --> 02:18:31,302
- And I don't think he wanted us to know.

2151
02:18:32,304 --> 02:18:36,266
He wanted us more to suspect one another.

2152
02:18:36,349 --> 02:18:37,934
Now, I never had to worry about that,

2153
02:18:38,018 --> 02:18:41,438
because they offed me about one third
of the way through the movie.

2154
02:18:44,899 --> 02:18:46,401
Ask Dave Clennon.

2155
02:18:48,111 --> 02:18:54,659
It doesn't matter if the character
I'm playing knows

2156
02:18:54,743 --> 02:19:01,291
he has been overtaken and absorbed
by this alien life form.

2157
02:19:01,374 --> 02:19:05,587
It doesn't matter,
because the behavior is identical

2158
02:19:05,670 --> 02:19:07,881
to what the behavior would have been

2159
02:19:07,964 --> 02:19:13,344
before the attack and absorption occurred.

2160
02:19:13,428 --> 02:19:16,431
You have those spiders
who are infected by lichens

2161
02:19:16,514 --> 02:19:19,225
or those ants that are affected
by some viruses

2162
02:19:19,309 --> 02:19:20,935
and they become zombies.

2163
02:19:21,019 --> 02:19:24,397
Uh, that might be the closest thing
we have in nature.

2164
02:19:26,274 --> 02:19:28,735
What happened to the mind?
What happened to consciousness?

2165
02:19:28,818 --> 02:19:30,361
What happened to all of those things?

2166
02:19:33,323 --> 02:19:35,950
What if this Thing
could imitate you perfectly?

2167
02:19:37,285 --> 02:19:42,290
How would you know that
you're not who I think you are?

2168
02:19:42,373 --> 02:19:45,627
Our answer to that was not necessarily
MacReady's answer.

2169
02:19:45,710 --> 02:19:48,171
MacReady's answer was, "I know I'm human."

2170
02:19:48,254 --> 02:19:50,632
But MacReady might be wrong.
He might not know.

2171
02:19:51,424 --> 02:19:57,222
It's an interesting gray area in the movie
how much memories

2172
02:19:57,305 --> 02:20:02,769
from the previous people, their--
their hosts, that they have access to.

2173
02:20:02,852 --> 02:20:05,897
They never really play around with that
in <i>The Thing</i>.

2174
02:20:05,980 --> 02:20:09,150
They never go,
"Tell me where you met your wife."

2175
02:20:09,234 --> 02:20:12,987
This is what's fascinating about films
that work in--

2176
02:20:13,071 --> 02:20:16,616
in fantasy horror is, you know,
what's-- what is it like to be a victim?

2177
02:20:16,699 --> 02:20:18,076
What is it like to be the killer?

2178
02:20:18,159 --> 02:20:21,121
In this case, you know,
is the human trapped inside?

2179
02:20:21,204 --> 02:20:25,166
Uh, in the back seat of his temporal car?

2180
02:20:25,250 --> 02:20:28,086
No longer hands on the wheel going,
"Oh my God, what's happening?"

2181
02:20:31,339 --> 02:20:32,841
- We did talk about cheating.

2182
02:20:32,924 --> 02:20:36,386
You know, actors playing it as a character
and then doing something for the audience

2183
02:20:36,469 --> 02:20:39,764
that's really misleading.
There's no cheating.

2184
02:20:41,933 --> 02:20:46,020
- And if you have that subtext of,
"Maybe you're not the person

2185
02:20:46,104 --> 02:20:52,819
I think you are", it adds a layer of fear
that you can't get by

2186
02:20:52,902 --> 02:20:55,447
slitting someone's throat
or blowing something up.

2187
02:20:55,530 --> 02:21:00,285
It's actually quite a brilliant insight
into mankind, isn't it?

2188
02:21:01,786 --> 02:21:04,164
I think it's easier for The Thing

2189
02:21:04,247 --> 02:21:06,958
to just let people believe that
they're human beings rather than

2190
02:21:07,041 --> 02:21:09,210
try to like imitate
what that person would do

2191
02:21:09,294 --> 02:21:12,380
under this situation, if that makes sense.

2192
02:21:12,463 --> 02:21:17,135
I think <i>The Thing</i> logic is
when you're infected,

2193
02:21:17,218 --> 02:21:20,263
you don't know you're infected
until the monster decides

2194
02:21:20,346 --> 02:21:21,681
to reveal itself.

2195
02:21:21,764 --> 02:21:23,516
So there are things we talked about
all the time.

2196
02:21:24,976 --> 02:21:28,646
More than any other show I ever worked on.

2197
02:21:30,023 --> 02:21:31,316
Because it was very tight.

2198
02:21:31,399 --> 02:21:33,443
It's-- it's a tough one to break down.

2199
02:21:38,656 --> 02:21:39,741
<i>How you doing, old boy?</i>

2200
02:21:39,824 --> 02:21:41,659
"How you doing, old boy?"

2201
02:21:41,743 --> 02:21:43,036
He liked him, you know what I mean?

2202
02:21:43,119 --> 02:21:45,955
He-- that's again-- The other thing is,
MacReady was like that guy.

2203
02:21:46,039 --> 02:21:48,500
He didn't dislike people for no reason.

2204
02:21:48,583 --> 02:21:49,667
He didn't like--

2205
02:21:49,751 --> 02:21:52,337
But you knew when, you know, he was fair.

2206
02:21:53,463 --> 02:21:55,089
<i>I don't know who to trust.</i>

2207
02:21:57,258 --> 02:21:58,718
<i>- I know what you mean, Blair.</i>

2208
02:22:01,054 --> 02:22:03,389
<i>Trust's a tough thing to come
by these days.</i>

2209
02:22:14,484 --> 02:22:16,528
<i>Somebody in this camp ain't
what he appears to be.</i>

2210
02:22:16,611 --> 02:22:19,822
<i>Right now, that may be one or two of us.</i>
<i>By spring, it could be all of us.</i>

2211
02:22:30,667 --> 02:22:32,502
<i>Is there some kind of test, Doc?</i>

2212
02:22:32,585 --> 02:22:34,546
<i>Well, yeah, possibly.</i>

2213
02:22:34,629 --> 02:22:37,131
<i>I've been thinking about</i>
<i>a blood serum test.</i>

2214
02:22:37,215 --> 02:22:42,262
Realizing that they shot
on a real glacier for a lot

2215
02:22:42,345 --> 02:22:47,100
of that movie, in the cold,
in the snow, in the remote,

2216
02:22:47,183 --> 02:22:50,520
desolate area, it just terrifies me.

2217
02:22:50,603 --> 02:22:55,483
It created an oppressive,
heavy environment.

2218
02:22:58,152 --> 02:23:00,446
So Universal's mandate to us was,
you know, he said,

2219
02:23:00,530 --> 02:23:03,241
"Whatever you do", when he said, you know,
"wherever you go, make sure,

2220
02:23:03,324 --> 02:23:06,536
damn sure there's snow
when you start filming."

2221
02:23:06,619 --> 02:23:09,080
And that led to Stewart, British Columbia,
by the way, um,

2222
02:23:09,163 --> 02:23:11,082
because it was the snowfall capital
of the world.

2223
02:23:12,667 --> 02:23:15,503
There was a copper mine
that had a road that went right by

2224
02:23:15,586 --> 02:23:18,631
this glacier, went up the top of the hill,
big copper mine.

2225
02:23:18,715 --> 02:23:22,010
And there was a little spur road off of it
that we built.

2226
02:23:22,093 --> 02:23:24,429
We were right on the side of a glacier.

2227
02:23:25,888 --> 02:23:28,516
John never saw any film. We shot there.

2228
02:23:28,599 --> 02:23:31,019
This was, I should say,
a more provincial time.

2229
02:23:31,102 --> 02:23:33,187
No electronic monitoring.

2230
02:23:33,271 --> 02:23:35,189
No way to see what we're seeing
outside of, you know,

2231
02:23:35,273 --> 02:23:36,649
viewing through the lens.

2232
02:23:39,527 --> 02:23:42,405
We were mid-mountain, and then below

2233
02:23:42,488 --> 02:23:46,200
was Stewart, British Columbia.
That's where we stayed.

2234
02:23:47,535 --> 02:23:50,079
- They flew us from L.A. to Anchorage.

2235
02:23:50,997 --> 02:23:56,252
And then from Anchorage to base camp
was a six-hour bus ride.

2236
02:23:57,086 --> 02:23:59,172
Over these mountains.

2237
02:24:00,381 --> 02:24:04,135
And it was the entire cast,
except for, I think, Brimley.

2238
02:24:06,054 --> 02:24:10,183
- And every day, the cast
would be bussed up the mountain,

2239
02:24:10,266 --> 02:24:12,477
up this treacherous road.

2240
02:24:12,560 --> 02:24:16,606
But they would call ahead
when the mining trucks were coming down,

2241
02:24:16,689 --> 02:24:20,318
and you had to get out of the way,
'cause they were barreling down.

2242
02:24:21,736 --> 02:24:25,406
So uh, being uh, the director
and above the line,

2243
02:24:25,490 --> 02:24:27,116
I flew up in a helicopter.

2244
02:24:28,993 --> 02:24:33,706
We had white-outs up there,
so we almost bought the farm.

2245
02:24:36,334 --> 02:24:38,044
- The rest of us were in this bus.

2246
02:24:39,003 --> 02:24:41,089
And we are climbing, and climbing,
and climbing,

2247
02:24:41,172 --> 02:24:46,928
and there is nothing for hundreds
of miles, but ice and boulders.

2248
02:24:48,680 --> 02:24:51,516
Now, I'm from Maine,
and I moved to Colorado

2249
02:24:51,599 --> 02:24:54,352
when I was very young,
when I was 25 years old.

2250
02:24:55,353 --> 02:24:58,189
I've spent a lot of time in the snow,
and ice.

2251
02:24:58,272 --> 02:25:01,442
It doesn't bother me. I like it.
I've always-- uh--

2252
02:25:01,526 --> 02:25:02,819
I feel very at home in it.

2253
02:25:02,902 --> 02:25:07,782
I'm sitting up in the front.
Um, the guys are in the back.

2254
02:25:07,865 --> 02:25:09,659
And then kinda it's a long ride,

2255
02:25:09,742 --> 02:25:11,452
so the guys are starting to doze off
and whatnot.

2256
02:25:11,536 --> 02:25:13,955
But I did not like the way this guy
was driving the bus.

2257
02:25:14,038 --> 02:25:18,126
I can remember the lights of the--
the bus on the snow

2258
02:25:18,209 --> 02:25:24,632
the-- the increasingly heavy snow
that was accumulating

2259
02:25:24,715 --> 02:25:27,343
on the road, on the mountain road.

2260
02:25:27,427 --> 02:25:29,595
And people kind of were wandering off.

2261
02:25:29,679 --> 02:25:32,765
They were going to sleep with their head
against the window or whatever.

2262
02:25:32,849 --> 02:25:37,061
And suddenly,
the bus driver yelled, "Slide!"

2263
02:25:37,145 --> 02:25:38,813
He locks up the ti-- locks it up.

2264
02:25:38,896 --> 02:25:42,191
And it's just gonna-- we're just gonna
slide slowly over the edge.

2265
02:25:44,318 --> 02:25:47,822
- This is the entire cast and crew
of the movie.

2266
02:25:47,905 --> 02:25:50,074
We could be gone.

2267
02:25:50,158 --> 02:25:53,828
I had to get it going sideways.
And then hit the brakes.

2268
02:25:53,911 --> 02:25:55,371
I just jumped over this guy.

2269
02:25:55,455 --> 02:25:58,040
And threw the wheel this way
and hit the gas.

2270
02:25:58,124 --> 02:26:01,627
And the left rear wheel goes off the road.

2271
02:26:01,711 --> 02:26:06,507
So Kurt says, "All right, everybody,
stay as still as possible.

2272
02:26:06,591 --> 02:26:08,259
Who's in the back of the bus?"

2273
02:26:08,342 --> 02:26:11,304
And he goes, "All right, Tommy,
get on your hands and knees

2274
02:26:11,387 --> 02:26:14,682
and crawl forward slowly.
Everybody stay still."

2275
02:26:14,765 --> 02:26:20,271
One by one we crawled off the bus
and we pushed the bus back onto the road.

2276
02:26:20,313 --> 02:26:22,315
And I remember turning around
and looking at the guys

2277
02:26:22,356 --> 02:26:24,025
and they were all just looking at me.

2278
02:26:24,567 --> 02:26:26,569
And they knew they had the right MacReady.

2279
02:26:28,654 --> 02:26:32,200
- And we arrived at base camp
at like 5:30 in the morning.

2280
02:26:32,283 --> 02:26:35,536
There was John Carpenter
standing on the corner,

2281
02:26:35,620 --> 02:26:40,791
25, 30 degrees below zero
with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth

2282
02:26:40,875 --> 02:26:45,671
waiting for us, shaking each
one of our hands

2283
02:26:45,755 --> 02:26:51,344
as we got off the bus, having no idea
of what just transpired.

2284
02:26:51,427 --> 02:26:53,554
That he almost lost all his men.

2285
02:26:57,683 --> 02:27:04,148
They had to face the fact that the film
itself could break up in the cold.

2286
02:27:04,232 --> 02:27:05,942
Uh, for us it was the circuits.

2287
02:27:06,025 --> 02:27:08,611
And it was the fact that
the batteries would die

2288
02:27:08,694 --> 02:27:11,864
so quickly for everything. It--

2289
02:27:11,948 --> 02:27:15,993
From that to uh, the-- the speed freezing
in the mouths of actors.

2290
02:27:16,077 --> 02:27:19,789
So their diction was terrible
and you couldn't understand

2291
02:27:19,872 --> 02:27:24,168
what language they were talking in to,
you know, actors getting

2292
02:27:24,252 --> 02:27:27,505
in a mood, because you--
you have to go, and go, and go

2293
02:27:27,588 --> 02:27:31,259
in-- in the cold and you have
to see their faces.

2294
02:27:33,678 --> 02:27:35,972
- The whole compound
that was gonna have to blow up

2295
02:27:36,055 --> 02:27:38,891
at the end of the movie,
that's where we hung out.

2296
02:27:38,975 --> 02:27:40,017
That's where we stayed.

2297
02:27:40,101 --> 02:27:44,522
We had to keep the temperature inside
at about 28 degrees,

2298
02:27:44,605 --> 02:27:47,024
so that it wouldn't melt the snow on top.

2299
02:27:47,900 --> 02:27:50,903
So we were never not in freezing weather.

2300
02:27:52,863 --> 02:27:56,576
- When truly you know that
if you stay out there

2301
02:27:56,659 --> 02:28:02,331
for 45 minutes, you can die,
it changes absolutely the nature

2302
02:28:02,415 --> 02:28:04,083
of what you're seeing on the screen.

2303
02:28:07,420 --> 02:28:10,214
- It was cold for John.
You know, John's a thin man.

2304
02:28:10,298 --> 02:28:11,716
I'm a-- I'm a big man.

2305
02:28:11,799 --> 02:28:15,678
So I had a-- I had some--
I had some blubber saving me

2306
02:28:15,761 --> 02:28:19,056
from the cold and John--
John didn't take to the cold that well.

2307
02:28:20,641 --> 02:28:25,229
Probably the actors coped
with uh, our-- our locations

2308
02:28:25,313 --> 02:28:26,606
better than I did.

2309
02:28:28,316 --> 02:28:30,651
- He's a trooper, you know.
He's gonna fight through it.

2310
02:28:30,735 --> 02:28:33,237
He's gonna slog through it
no matter what it is.

2311
02:28:33,321 --> 02:28:35,615
And it's fun to watch him slog through it,

2312
02:28:35,698 --> 02:28:39,118
'cause he's, you know,
he-- he doesn't have that

2313
02:28:39,201 --> 02:28:42,038
Man Mountain Dean
let's go get it kind of--

2314
02:28:42,121 --> 02:28:43,873
He's not that guy.

2315
02:28:43,956 --> 02:28:47,209
But he was involved
with a lot of people that were gung-ho

2316
02:28:47,293 --> 02:28:50,504
and going for it, and so there he was
and he was leading the pack.

2317
02:29:06,812 --> 02:29:09,315
Let me explain about
the South Pole seasons.

2318
02:29:09,398 --> 02:29:11,317
There's only two at the South Pole.

2319
02:29:11,400 --> 02:29:14,362
There's summer. Summer runs
from about November 1st

2320
02:29:14,445 --> 02:29:16,155
to about February 15th.

2321
02:29:16,238 --> 02:29:20,034
That's when it's light 24 hours a day.
Relatively warmer.

2322
02:29:20,117 --> 02:29:22,912
But once you get to February 15th,

2323
02:29:22,995 --> 02:29:25,539
that's usually about the time
the last flight will leave.

2324
02:29:25,623 --> 02:29:28,292
You know, you've got the first
goddamn week of winter.

2325
02:29:28,376 --> 02:29:30,044
<i>First goddamn week of winter.</i>

2326
02:29:30,127 --> 02:29:33,005
And that, you know,
the craziness can come out

2327
02:29:33,089 --> 02:29:34,590
at that point in time.

2328
02:29:34,674 --> 02:29:36,676
All those people that have held back
and let it go

2329
02:29:36,759 --> 02:29:38,761
a little bit once that flight leaves.

2330
02:29:41,097 --> 02:29:44,183
<i>The Thing</i>, the movie <i>The Thing</i>,
it's a rite of passage.

2331
02:29:44,266 --> 02:29:46,060
The first weekend after everybody's gone,

2332
02:29:46,143 --> 02:29:48,479
the summer people are gone,
there'll be a showing.

2333
02:29:48,562 --> 02:29:50,564
What I'd like to do is get up
in front of the crew

2334
02:29:50,648 --> 02:29:52,733
and then tell 'em that right away that

2335
02:29:52,817 --> 02:29:54,026
it's a training video.

2336
02:29:54,110 --> 02:29:55,778
You see the dynamics of the crew.

2337
02:29:55,861 --> 02:29:58,364
You see the dynamics
of the leadership, for example.

2338
02:29:58,447 --> 02:29:59,907
You know, or lack of leadership.

2339
02:29:59,990 --> 02:30:02,576
[overlapping speech]

2340
02:30:02,660 --> 02:30:04,912
I think the film feels authentic.

2341
02:30:07,748 --> 02:30:10,710
The sound design is,
I don't get involved with in general.

2342
02:30:11,711 --> 02:30:16,382
But the atmosphere, the sound
of the Antarctic was amazing.

2343
02:30:18,050 --> 02:30:21,637
One thing that was shown
pretty well is that

2344
02:30:21,721 --> 02:30:23,597
you do the things you need to do
where you can,

2345
02:30:23,681 --> 02:30:25,850
where you have space to do it.

2346
02:30:25,933 --> 02:30:29,019
You also have very narrow corridors.

2347
02:30:29,103 --> 02:30:34,608
You are trying to cram as much as you can
in as little space as-- as-- as you need.

2348
02:30:35,443 --> 02:30:37,111
- Of course,
they've got weaponry in there.

2349
02:30:37,194 --> 02:30:38,362
They've got a flamethrower.

2350
02:30:38,446 --> 02:30:40,740
They've got things that fortunately
we don't have.

2351
02:30:42,199 --> 02:30:43,367
The blood supply, I'm not sure.

2352
02:30:43,451 --> 02:30:46,037
I know that we have a very competent
medical staff

2353
02:30:46,120 --> 02:30:48,539
with a doctor, I know
we could do transfusions

2354
02:30:48,622 --> 02:30:49,790
and stuff if we had to.

2355
02:30:49,874 --> 02:30:51,292
I'm not sure actually if they were--

2356
02:30:51,375 --> 02:30:54,295
There certainly wouldn't be anything
like they show in <i>The Thing</i>.

2357
02:30:56,130 --> 02:31:00,009
But I smiled at the room
where they are playing.

2358
02:31:00,092 --> 02:31:03,637
Because that tells you also
this is the end of the day.

2359
02:31:03,721 --> 02:31:06,974
You are in a very, very
extreme environment.

2360
02:31:07,057 --> 02:31:08,309
But in that place,

2361
02:31:08,392 --> 02:31:10,311
all of a sudden,
you are done with your day.

2362
02:31:10,394 --> 02:31:14,273
You are becoming a person again.
You are not the scientist.

2363
02:31:14,356 --> 02:31:16,317
You are not a function.

2364
02:31:16,400 --> 02:31:18,068
And then you can relax.

2365
02:31:22,406 --> 02:31:24,366
There is drinking
at the South Pole station

2366
02:31:24,450 --> 02:31:26,619
and at times it has been an issue
in the past.

2367
02:31:26,702 --> 02:31:28,120
But it's not like that.

2368
02:31:28,162 --> 02:31:29,663
<i>Mac, it may not clear up for a week.</i>

2369
02:31:29,789 --> 02:31:30,873
<i>-Yeah.</i>
<i>-And we're the closest to…</i>

2370
02:31:30,956 --> 02:31:33,000
- Uh, the things
that were completely ludicrous is

2371
02:31:33,083 --> 02:31:36,837
to have somebody by minus 40
coming out in a leather jacket

2372
02:31:36,921 --> 02:31:38,464
and a cowboy hat.

2373
02:31:38,547 --> 02:31:42,426
I mean, that person is dead
within 10 minutes. Right?

2374
02:31:42,510 --> 02:31:45,513
You can be Kurt Russell,
but you're gonna be dead in 10 minutes.

2375
02:31:45,596 --> 02:31:48,933
And your leather jacket
is going to be so hard

2376
02:31:49,016 --> 02:31:52,436
that you are probably going to be able
to break it with an ice pick.

2377
02:32:03,030 --> 02:32:05,699
- I remember coming out of a bar
in the middle of the night.

2378
02:32:05,783 --> 02:32:08,869
It was like 12:00, 11:30 at night
and it was still like dusk

2379
02:32:08,953 --> 02:32:11,038
and I'm going like, "What the fuck?"

2380
02:32:11,121 --> 02:32:12,748
You know, it was like weird.

2381
02:32:12,832 --> 02:32:16,085
You know, we had like an hour of--
of uh, night time.

2382
02:32:18,003 --> 02:32:20,339
- Stewart, British Columbia
and Hyder, Alaska.

2383
02:32:20,422 --> 02:32:22,216
It was kind of-- kind of a lawless place.

2384
02:32:22,299 --> 02:32:26,095
Uh, the-- as I recall,
the police only came in

2385
02:32:26,178 --> 02:32:28,430
to that area twice a year.

2386
02:32:28,514 --> 02:32:30,891
And when they did,
everybody just left town.

2387
02:32:30,975 --> 02:32:36,063
Seriously, they-- they just disappeared
for like 24 to 48 hours.

2388
02:32:37,648 --> 02:32:40,818
Actors love to be directed,
but when they are not directed,

2389
02:32:40,901 --> 02:32:44,488
they start wandering, and drinking,
and searching for women.

2390
02:32:45,489 --> 02:32:48,742
And this was what happened
on Saturday nights.

2391
02:32:50,119 --> 02:32:52,079
It was unbelievable.

2392
02:32:52,162 --> 02:32:55,249
Well, there were no women
down there, so uh,

2393
02:32:55,332 --> 02:33:00,004
it was-- it was a little desperate,
but we survived.

2394
02:33:00,087 --> 02:33:03,090
So there was just a bunch of guys
just getting, you know,

2395
02:33:03,173 --> 02:33:06,051
shit-faced every Friday
and Saturday night.

2396
02:33:06,135 --> 02:33:08,846
I forget how long we were there.
I think it was three weeks maybe.

2397
02:33:08,929 --> 02:33:11,891
It could have been longer,
but I think it was three weeks.

2398
02:33:11,974 --> 02:33:14,560
Yeah, we all sort of bonded on that, too.

2399
02:33:15,769 --> 02:33:19,064
There was a one bar, two bars.

2400
02:33:19,106 --> 02:33:22,526
I can't remember the name of one of 'em.
The other one was called, "The Hyder Inn".

2401
02:33:23,402 --> 02:33:27,656
It was a little, you know, shithole bar.

2402
02:33:27,740 --> 02:33:31,285
But they had this thing called,
uh, "being Hyderized".

2403
02:33:31,368 --> 02:33:33,621
They had this booze called, "Everclear".

2404
02:33:33,704 --> 02:33:34,747
It's really alcohol.

2405
02:33:34,830 --> 02:33:37,750
It's only-- it's like 90,
it's like 180 proof.

2406
02:33:37,833 --> 02:33:40,961
It's-- it's 90% alcohol.

2407
02:33:41,045 --> 02:33:45,090
And they throw it in a shot glass
and-- and they set it on fire,

2408
02:33:45,174 --> 02:33:47,718
and you have to blow it out,
and-- and chug it down

2409
02:33:47,801 --> 02:33:50,429
and then you get this card that said,
"You've been Hyderized."

2410
02:33:50,512 --> 02:33:54,725
There was a bartender poured Everclear
all over the bar

2411
02:33:54,808 --> 02:33:58,062
like this, up and down the bar
and then lit it.

2412
02:33:58,938 --> 02:34:04,401
There's blue flames rising up here
and his name was Barfly

2413
02:34:04,485 --> 02:34:06,737
and he would-- he goes like this
with his hands

2414
02:34:06,820 --> 02:34:09,114
and holds his hands up
and his hands are burning

2415
02:34:09,198 --> 02:34:11,909
and the flames are rising
from his fingertips.

2416
02:34:11,992 --> 02:34:14,078
Uh, I was one of the first
to be Hyderized.

2417
02:34:14,161 --> 02:34:16,038
I drank-- I drank a little. No, not much.

2418
02:34:16,121 --> 02:34:20,209
Um, some weak pot and you know,
the operative drug on choice,

2419
02:34:20,292 --> 02:34:22,336
by the way, on the movie
was nicotine, you know?

2420
02:34:23,420 --> 02:34:25,506
John was two or three packs a day,
so was I.

2421
02:34:27,091 --> 02:34:30,010
I took T.K. and uh, Keith in
to be Hyderized

2422
02:34:30,094 --> 02:34:31,553
which was an interesting moment.

2423
02:34:33,722 --> 02:34:36,684
And um, too rough a story to tell.

2424
02:34:36,767 --> 02:34:38,435
Um, it was a strange place.

2425
02:34:38,519 --> 02:34:40,604
I mean, there were strange people
up there.

2426
02:34:40,688 --> 02:34:45,109
And uh, they weren't used
to certain things, so…

2427
02:34:46,652 --> 02:34:49,989
When those things started
to go sideways, it wasn't good.

2428
02:34:50,072 --> 02:34:52,783
They weren't particularly happy
with this crew

2429
02:34:52,866 --> 02:34:55,869
coming into their places and dancing
with the women

2430
02:34:55,953 --> 02:34:57,371
that were in town and whatnot.

2431
02:34:57,454 --> 02:34:59,999
It was like once a week.
It was kind of interesting.

2432
02:35:01,208 --> 02:35:04,586
Someone was having a fight
with her husband at a table

2433
02:35:04,670 --> 02:35:08,465
halfway across the room,
getting very loud.

2434
02:35:10,342 --> 02:35:16,515
And she finally gets up
and makes her way back to our table.

2435
02:35:16,598 --> 02:35:21,687
And sits down between Keith and T.K.

2436
02:35:21,770 --> 02:35:24,606
And I told the guys, I said, "You know,

2437
02:35:24,690 --> 02:35:29,153
I really think it would be wise
if you leave the room now."

2438
02:35:29,236 --> 02:35:31,280
They did. They got up and left the room.

2439
02:35:32,823 --> 02:35:35,909
Because they're wearing guns up there.

2440
02:35:35,993 --> 02:35:41,165
I mean, it got really racial um,
in a very, very nasty way.

2441
02:35:41,248 --> 02:35:46,170
Nasty. I never went back in there
and I-- I never hoped to go back in there.

2442
02:35:46,253 --> 02:35:48,422
But it was really frightening.

2443
02:35:56,305 --> 02:35:58,807
<i>- Garry! Hey, you guys! Come here!</i>

2444
02:36:00,142 --> 02:36:02,227
Who got to the blood supply?

2445
02:36:02,311 --> 02:36:03,604
<i>What?</i>

2446
02:36:03,687 --> 02:36:05,272
<i>-Somebody got to the blood! -What?</i>

2447
02:36:06,940 --> 02:36:08,442
<i>-Where's Clark? -Right here.</i>

2448
02:36:08,525 --> 02:36:11,987
I said to John once,
"Isn't this a movie about paranoia?"

2449
02:36:13,655 --> 02:36:15,032
And then he said, "Could be."

2450
02:36:16,075 --> 02:36:19,661
<i>-Wait a minute. Was this broken into?</i>
<i>-No, the lock is undamaged.</i>

2451
02:36:19,745 --> 02:36:21,914
<i>Somebody opened it, closed it,</i>
<i>and then locked it.</i>

2452
02:36:21,997 --> 02:36:22,831
<i>- Great.</i>

2453
02:36:22,915 --> 02:36:26,168
Well, the main idea of <i>The Thing</i>
is that lack of trust.

2454
02:36:27,336 --> 02:36:30,005
So you lose the ability to trust.

2455
02:36:30,089 --> 02:36:36,053
"Who are you? Who goes there?
Who? Are you human or not?"

2456
02:36:36,136 --> 02:36:40,224
And that was-- that was the essence of it.
That was what we dug around in.

2457
02:36:40,307 --> 02:36:46,021
And it wasn't just a monster going, "boo".

2458
02:36:46,105 --> 02:36:47,940
I think the film is about paranoia.

2459
02:36:48,816 --> 02:36:51,860
That-- just that. That's what it's about.

2460
02:36:51,944 --> 02:36:54,321
There's this horrific thing
that's just trying

2461
02:36:54,404 --> 02:36:55,948
to survive like we are.

2462
02:36:57,407 --> 02:36:59,576
It's, you know, survival of the fittest.

2463
02:37:00,494 --> 02:37:02,746
<i>Would that test have worked, doc?</i>

2464
02:37:02,830 --> 02:37:04,039
<i>Oh, I think so. Yes.</i>

2465
02:37:04,123 --> 02:37:05,791
<i>- Somebody else sure as hell thought so.</i>

2466
02:37:05,874 --> 02:37:08,502
And when the creature
comes across the camp, of course,

2467
02:37:08,585 --> 02:37:11,421
the men are already in the process
of falling apart.

2468
02:37:11,505 --> 02:37:14,299
I mean, they're already halfway
at each other's throats.

2469
02:37:14,383 --> 02:37:17,344
And it's that sense that
the creature senses and works on,

2470
02:37:17,427 --> 02:37:18,470
you know, of course.

2471
02:37:19,680 --> 02:37:22,933
When you add Rob's monster,
which also deconstructs,

2472
02:37:23,016 --> 02:37:24,685
it's the perfect visual metaphor.

2473
02:37:24,768 --> 02:37:27,646
And I think it was Tarantino
who said it perfectly,

2474
02:37:27,729 --> 02:37:32,151
'cause he based a lot of <i>Reservoir Dogs</i>
on <i>The Thing</i>,

2475
02:37:32,234 --> 02:37:37,072
because what he said was, "It's the
paranoia, that they're so confined

2476
02:37:37,156 --> 02:37:39,533
and the paranoia builds, and builds,
and starts bouncing

2477
02:37:39,616 --> 02:37:41,702
off the walls, starts bouncing everywhere

2478
02:37:41,785 --> 02:37:45,205
until it's only got one place to go,
out into the audience."

2479
02:37:45,289 --> 02:37:46,415
<i>Great.</i>

2480
02:37:47,666 --> 02:37:51,170
- And that I just happened to be
in a great production

2481
02:37:51,253 --> 02:37:54,840
of a great play called, American Buffalo
by David Mamet

2482
02:37:54,923 --> 02:37:57,926
with one of the greatest actors
in the world, Al Pacino.

2483
02:37:58,010 --> 02:38:03,682
And it was a huge hit in New York
in 1980, '81.

2484
02:38:03,765 --> 02:38:07,519
And I guess Kurt and John
were in town auditioning actors

2485
02:38:07,603 --> 02:38:10,439
and they must have gotten tickets,
'cause I know Kurt

2486
02:38:10,522 --> 02:38:14,276
hates to go to New York,
so yeah, they forced him to go.

2487
02:38:14,359 --> 02:38:16,278
But they came to see me and it--

2488
02:38:16,361 --> 02:38:19,364
and they must have liked me
or my performance, I guess.

2489
02:38:19,448 --> 02:38:20,908
<i>-Why would he come in here and take it?</i>
<i>-Shut up, man!</i>

2490
02:38:20,991 --> 02:38:22,034
<i>-Windows!</i>
<i>-Windows!</i>

2491
02:38:23,911 --> 02:38:29,625
And it was in rehearsal that I changed
the name of the character,

2492
02:38:29,708 --> 02:38:34,254
'cause they changed it from Sanchez
to John Simmons.

2493
02:38:34,338 --> 02:38:39,009
And I can't think of a more boring name
than John Simmons.

2494
02:38:43,472 --> 02:38:47,059
And-- and the character kind of
saw himself

2495
02:38:47,142 --> 02:38:48,936
as better than this place.

2496
02:38:49,019 --> 02:38:51,772
You know, "I deserve better than
to be stuck out here checking

2497
02:38:51,855 --> 02:38:53,815
the freaking weather and I'm gonna--

2498
02:38:53,899 --> 02:38:55,776
I'm gonna go to Hollywood
and be a movie star."

2499
02:38:55,859 --> 02:38:58,695
So if you notice, I'm reading
a movie glam magazine.

2500
02:39:01,406 --> 02:39:04,159
He was the kind of actor
who had-- had listened

2501
02:39:04,243 --> 02:39:05,786
and heard the phrase,

2502
02:39:05,869 --> 02:39:08,664
"There's no such thing as small roles,
only small actors."

2503
02:39:08,747 --> 02:39:10,832
I think he took that one to heart.
It was great.

2504
02:39:10,916 --> 02:39:14,044
He does nothing-- you know,
he wants to make something out of this.

2505
02:39:14,127 --> 02:39:17,089
<i>You guys gonna listen to Garry?</i>
<i>You gonna let him give the orders?</i>

2506
02:39:17,172 --> 02:39:19,216
<i>I mean, he could be one of those things.</i>

2507
02:39:19,299 --> 02:39:24,096
I found a pair of these green sunglasses,
and I-- I wore them in rehearsal one day.

2508
02:39:24,179 --> 02:39:27,975
And I said, "John, I want everybody
to call me, 'Windows'."

2509
02:39:28,767 --> 02:39:29,810
And he went…

2510
02:39:38,360 --> 02:39:41,196
"All right, from now on, everybody,
Tommy wants us to call him, 'Windows'.

2511
02:39:41,280 --> 02:39:42,948
Let's go on to the next scene, please."

2512
02:39:43,907 --> 02:39:45,409
We're in a sound stage.

2513
02:39:45,492 --> 02:39:47,703
There's only light on where the table is,

2514
02:39:47,786 --> 02:39:51,164
this huge table that they set up
for us to be around.

2515
02:39:51,248 --> 02:39:56,753
And you know, that's when
Tom Waites said, "I-- I-- I--

2516
02:39:56,837 --> 02:39:59,089
uh, I'd like everybody to call me,
'Windows'.

2517
02:39:59,172 --> 02:40:01,174
Um, you know,
I want to wear these glasses."

2518
02:40:01,258 --> 02:40:04,261
And-- and all of us kind of looked
at each other like,

2519
02:40:04,344 --> 02:40:07,139
"That's the dumbest fucking thing
I ever heard."

2520
02:40:07,222 --> 02:40:09,891
But we did it, you know,
and it was great. It was great.

2521
02:40:09,975 --> 02:40:13,312
Tommy was right. He's--
he's got wonderful instincts.

2522
02:40:16,231 --> 02:40:20,861
When Tommy declared that
he wanted to be called, "Windows",

2523
02:40:20,944 --> 02:40:26,158
and John said, "Okay", and we all had

2524
02:40:26,241 --> 02:40:29,453
to cross out his character's name
from our scripts

2525
02:40:29,536 --> 02:40:30,746
and write in Windows.

2526
02:40:30,829 --> 02:40:34,875
And Donald was beside himself
that anybody could ask that

2527
02:40:34,958 --> 02:40:39,254
question of a director, uh,
that they change the name,

2528
02:40:39,338 --> 02:40:41,506
you know, to suit themselves.

2529
02:40:41,590 --> 02:40:44,009
He was really pissed off,
really pissed off.

2530
02:40:44,843 --> 02:40:46,261
<i>It's on the floor.</i>

2531
02:40:51,350 --> 02:40:54,978
And when I was cutting the scene,
I thought this is gonna be a--

2532
02:40:55,062 --> 02:40:58,815
a real ball-breaker,
because um, it's so tense.

2533
02:40:58,899 --> 02:41:00,901
And it builds,
and it's gonna run down the hall,

2534
02:41:00,984 --> 02:41:05,155
and you know, come to fruition there
with Windows.

2535
02:41:05,238 --> 02:41:07,908
And yet it almost cut itself.

2536
02:41:09,326 --> 02:41:11,036
<i>I don't know about Copper.</i>

2537
02:41:12,537 --> 02:41:15,290
<i>But I give you my word,</i>
<i>I did not go near that blood.</i>

2538
02:41:15,374 --> 02:41:21,129
A beautiful piece of direction
and uh, uh, film construction

2539
02:41:21,213 --> 02:41:23,298
and understanding of what you were trying

2540
02:41:23,382 --> 02:41:25,550
to achieve in that scene as it terminates

2541
02:41:25,634 --> 02:41:28,512
when they give up the pistol.

2542
02:41:28,595 --> 02:41:31,139
You can't say that's really
a big physical action scene,

2543
02:41:31,223 --> 02:41:34,559
but, by God, um, emotionally,
it's every bit of--

2544
02:41:34,643 --> 02:41:36,228
of an action scene.

2545
02:41:36,311 --> 02:41:38,397
<i>-I'll take it. -Like hell you will.</i>

2546
02:41:39,564 --> 02:41:42,150
<i>It should be somebody</i>
<i>a little more even-tempered, Childs.</i>

2547
02:41:43,402 --> 02:41:45,695
It was always one of my favorite
scenes in the film.

2548
02:41:45,779 --> 02:41:48,240
I-- I think it was one of the most
powerful scenes in the film.

2549
02:41:48,323 --> 02:41:51,410
And-- and it really, at that point
in the storyline,

2550
02:41:51,493 --> 02:41:56,331
it really fired off uh,
where we were going with this.

2551
02:42:00,419 --> 02:42:01,920
<i>- I know I'm human.</i>

2552
02:42:03,964 --> 02:42:08,009
They went up before I did up to--
to start shooting on the glacier.

2553
02:42:08,093 --> 02:42:11,012
And when I got there,
they were talking about,

2554
02:42:11,096 --> 02:42:13,098
"Well, we're-- you know,
tomorrow we're doing this."

2555
02:42:13,181 --> 02:42:15,350
I said, "No, we shot that already.

2556
02:42:15,434 --> 02:42:17,811
We shot that in the rec room.
What are you talking about?"

2557
02:42:17,894 --> 02:42:20,105
And it was the scene, "I know I'm human",

2558
02:42:20,188 --> 02:42:22,649
where he's burning
all the blood bags and stuff.

2559
02:42:22,733 --> 02:42:24,401
That scene was all shot in the rec room.

2560
02:42:24,484 --> 02:42:26,695
It was incredibly intense.

2561
02:42:26,778 --> 02:42:30,740
And then John moved it outside,
and we're standing there at night,

2562
02:42:30,824 --> 02:42:34,744
in the dark in Antarctica, talking.

2563
02:42:34,828 --> 02:42:36,413
You know, who does that?

2564
02:42:42,586 --> 02:42:46,840
I just thought, "Oh man,
he's just totally screwing this movie up.

2565
02:42:46,923 --> 02:42:48,967
I can't believe he's doing this.

2566
02:42:49,050 --> 02:42:52,971
And I was-- when I left uh,
that-- that second part

2567
02:42:53,054 --> 02:42:55,390
of the shoot, I was despondent.

2568
02:42:55,474 --> 02:42:58,143
I thought,
"Just why did he panic like that?"

2569
02:42:59,728 --> 02:43:01,646
So then I went to see the film.

2570
02:43:01,730 --> 02:43:04,232
And it was great, and it really worked.

2571
02:43:04,316 --> 02:43:06,902
Now, for me,
I still can't watch that scene

2572
02:43:06,985 --> 02:43:11,406
without going, "Nope, nope, nope,
wrong, wrong, fucking wrong."

2573
02:43:11,490 --> 02:43:13,783
I can't do it. I just can't watch it.

2574
02:43:13,867 --> 02:43:17,412
And John, I'm sure,
would completely disagree with me.

2575
02:43:17,496 --> 02:43:21,124
<i>- This thing doesn't wanna show itself.</i>
<i>It wants to hide inside an imitation.</i>

2576
02:43:21,917 --> 02:43:23,835
<i>It'll fight if it has to.</i>

2577
02:43:23,919 --> 02:43:25,795
<i>But it's vulnerable out in the open.</i>

2578
02:43:25,879 --> 02:43:31,718
It definitely has a sophistication
and an emotional intelligence to it

2579
02:43:31,801 --> 02:43:37,724
that is not really what people
were necessarily craving in the '80s

2580
02:43:37,807 --> 02:43:41,686
and harkens back to an earlier time,
the '70s films.

2581
02:43:41,770 --> 02:43:43,647
<i>There's a storm hitting us in six hours.</i>

2582
02:43:44,898 --> 02:43:46,733
<i>We're gonna find out who's who.</i>

2583
02:43:46,816 --> 02:43:50,737
Carpenter came of age,
of filmmaking age, in the '70s.

2584
02:43:50,820 --> 02:43:52,781
He is a child of that era.

2585
02:43:54,741 --> 02:43:59,371
Without question,
this has resonance in every era,

2586
02:43:59,454 --> 02:44:04,251
because there's always an other
that people can point to

2587
02:44:04,334 --> 02:44:08,380
and say, "That's the--
we have to watch out for them.

2588
02:44:08,463 --> 02:44:09,673
They're the problem."

2589
02:44:09,756 --> 02:44:11,299
<i>Mac, I'm not a prisoner!</i>

2590
02:44:13,051 --> 02:44:17,681
- Now, in a more specific sense
to the film, part of it is,

2591
02:44:17,764 --> 02:44:20,850
can you trust who you think you can trust?

2592
02:44:20,934 --> 02:44:24,813
And if not, what happens to society?

2593
02:44:25,605 --> 02:44:28,525
And if you can't trust anybody,
there is no society,

2594
02:44:28,608 --> 02:44:29,901
which is what happens to us.

2595
02:44:29,985 --> 02:44:32,320
<i>Here, let me-- let me do it.</i>
<i>You're gonna break the needle in my arm.</i>

2596
02:44:32,404 --> 02:44:35,615
<i>No, Doc. He's doing a real fine job.</i>

2597
02:44:35,699 --> 02:44:40,203
The thematics of it, it being
so mappable to so many different

2598
02:44:40,287 --> 02:44:43,290
real-world analogs, is just the mark
of a good story to me.

2599
02:44:44,165 --> 02:44:45,625
- <i>The Thing</i> was one where I just--

2600
02:44:45,709 --> 02:44:49,629
I felt like you could very much feel
a sense of Cold War paranoia.

2601
02:44:49,713 --> 02:44:54,968
You know, the idea of living in a time
where maybe we're just

2602
02:44:55,051 --> 02:44:57,429
gonna blow each other up at any moment.

2603
02:44:57,512 --> 02:45:01,558
Are we really good custodians
of this world?

2604
02:45:04,477 --> 02:45:06,980
- Every horror film speaks
to every individual

2605
02:45:07,063 --> 02:45:08,607
in a different way.

2606
02:45:08,690 --> 02:45:11,693
To say it's about AIDS
kind of diminishes it.

2607
02:45:11,776 --> 02:45:13,778
It can be about AIDS,
but it can be about a lot

2608
02:45:13,862 --> 02:45:16,615
of other things,
a lot of other subjects, too.

2609
02:45:18,533 --> 02:45:20,952
- When somebody goes nuts and you know,

2610
02:45:21,036 --> 02:45:23,788
starts shooting people,
or what-- you know,

2611
02:45:23,872 --> 02:45:26,207
they check with the co-workers,
and the co-workers go,

2612
02:45:26,291 --> 02:45:29,628
"I did-- I never saw any sign of it,
and he seemed

2613
02:45:29,711 --> 02:45:31,171
like a normal person."

2614
02:45:31,254 --> 02:45:35,467
Well, that's kind of what <i>The Thing</i>
is about as well.

2615
02:45:35,550 --> 02:45:39,763
So I think it touches on aspects
of humanity that are always

2616
02:45:39,846 --> 02:45:42,182
with us and always will be with us.

2617
02:45:43,558 --> 02:45:48,438
I see today there's a meme all um,
over the internet now,

2618
02:45:48,521 --> 02:45:50,190
which is of Kurt's soliloquy.

2619
02:45:50,273 --> 02:45:52,233
<i>Nobody trusts anybody now.</i>

2620
02:45:54,235 --> 02:45:55,779
<i>And we're all very tired.</i>

2621
02:45:56,446 --> 02:45:59,574
Pretty apt description of the way
we're feeling in America these days.

2622
02:46:00,784 --> 02:46:03,703
I'm gonna hide this tape
when I'm finished.

2623
02:46:03,787 --> 02:46:07,123
<i>If none of us make it, at least</i>
<i>there'll be some kind of record.</i>

2624
02:46:07,207 --> 02:46:10,752
I just found it interesting that
he was putting it on tape.

2625
02:46:10,835 --> 02:46:13,672
<i>We still have nothing to go on.</i>

2626
02:46:13,755 --> 02:46:16,007
- Leave a record, so somebody
can pick it up from there?

2627
02:46:16,091 --> 02:46:17,509
Yeah, that's one possibility.

2628
02:46:17,592 --> 02:46:21,054
You could say he's putting it on tape
for a number of different reasons.

2629
02:46:22,847 --> 02:46:24,808
I just always thought
that was an interesting one.

2630
02:46:39,280 --> 02:46:40,323
<i>Hey, Blair!</i>

2631
02:46:42,784 --> 02:46:44,327
<i>Blair, have you seen Fuchs?</i>

2632
02:47:01,177 --> 02:47:04,389
I'd never seen that palette
in a horror movie before.

2633
02:47:04,472 --> 02:47:06,433
The blues, the whites, that-- the dark.

2634
02:47:06,516 --> 02:47:08,893
Just being able to see people's breath.

2635
02:47:12,188 --> 02:47:13,940
If you watch the film, it's always blue.

2636
02:47:14,023 --> 02:47:16,276
The ice is blue, outside's blue.

2637
02:47:16,359 --> 02:47:18,319
And they tried so many different
types of blue

2638
02:47:18,403 --> 02:47:20,280
just to see what worked on camera.

2639
02:47:20,363 --> 02:47:24,576
And they discovered the best blue were
the landing lights out at the airport.

2640
02:47:24,659 --> 02:47:26,202
<i>Blair?</i>

2641
02:47:26,286 --> 02:47:31,124
But there is something magical about
a Dean Cundey movie shot on film,

2642
02:47:31,207 --> 02:47:32,959
and especially with John Carpenter.

2643
02:47:34,335 --> 02:47:39,632
What I think Dean excels at uh, is
making-- making it look glamorous

2644
02:47:39,716 --> 02:47:42,802
and still making it look ab--
absolutely real and terrifying.

2645
02:47:42,886 --> 02:47:46,389
<i>There's nothing else I can do. Just wait.</i>

2646
02:47:49,893 --> 02:47:52,604
- There's always red,
and that's coming from the flares.

2647
02:47:52,687 --> 02:47:55,648
And it was only the flares,
the actual road flares, that used it.

2648
02:47:55,732 --> 02:47:59,444
Which would never be done today,
'cause those things are absolutely toxic.

2649
02:48:05,450 --> 02:48:11,081
I loved that John wasn't jumping
in front of the camera

2650
02:48:11,164 --> 02:48:13,875
and doing flashy camera things and kept--

2651
02:48:13,958 --> 02:48:18,463
It was a very solid,
very stolid kind of approach

2652
02:48:18,546 --> 02:48:22,801
to directing something.
He didn't over cover things.

2653
02:48:22,884 --> 02:48:24,844
Every-- every shot mattered.

2654
02:48:26,095 --> 02:48:30,475
- Coming from making a show
about darkness and ice, let me tell you

2655
02:48:30,558 --> 02:48:35,939
that that very, very tricky line,
very thin line,

2656
02:48:36,022 --> 02:48:39,442
between not seeing,
because you're in the dark,

2657
02:48:39,526 --> 02:48:42,445
but seeing enough to understand the scene,

2658
02:48:42,529 --> 02:48:46,658
is the hardest thing to achieve
for a DP. It's just masterful.

2659
02:48:49,661 --> 02:48:53,623
- John is a very quiet man,
generally speaking.

2660
02:48:53,706 --> 02:48:57,335
Not that he's antisocial or you know,
he's a great guy

2661
02:48:57,418 --> 02:49:01,089
to have a beer with,
but as human beings go,

2662
02:49:01,172 --> 02:49:05,468
some of us are more loquacious,
like myself.

2663
02:49:06,636 --> 02:49:09,973
Of course, when he's directing,
he's a warrior, you know,

2664
02:49:10,056 --> 02:49:11,224
because you have to be.

2665
02:49:13,518 --> 02:49:17,814
- I would say he was businesslike.
He was about getting the shots.

2666
02:49:17,897 --> 02:49:22,527
And he was somewhat indulgent,
I think, with the actors.

2667
02:49:22,610 --> 02:49:24,112
<i>Hey, fuck you, Palmer!</i>

2668
02:49:24,195 --> 02:49:26,197
<i>-I'm going with you!</i>
<i>-Who says I want you going with me?</i>

2669
02:49:26,281 --> 02:49:28,700
<i>All right, cut the bullshit!</i>

2670
02:49:28,783 --> 02:49:33,288
A poet is visionary.
They see, like Yeats, he sees ahead.

2671
02:49:33,371 --> 02:49:35,957
Uh, and that's what I think John is.

2672
02:49:36,040 --> 02:49:38,710
He's kind of a filmic poet.

2673
02:49:40,795 --> 02:49:42,881
- John can shoot fast,
but he shoots completely.

2674
02:49:42,964 --> 02:49:44,173
He knows what he wants.

2675
02:49:44,257 --> 02:49:46,718
He-- he's-- he's seeing the movie
in his head.

2676
02:49:50,638 --> 02:49:54,934
- He's very aware of visual storytelling,
using the camera.

2677
02:49:55,018 --> 02:50:00,106
Not using the camera just
to record stuff, but creating mood.

2678
02:50:04,527 --> 02:50:08,323
Well, I found him to have
a great sense of humor.

2679
02:50:08,406 --> 02:50:11,409
There's a lot of joking on the set.

2680
02:50:11,492 --> 02:50:16,039
- He doesn't uh, like to take credit
for things.

2681
02:50:16,122 --> 02:50:19,542
Doesn't like to be complimented.
He doesn't care for that.

2682
02:50:19,626 --> 02:50:23,630
He-- he finds it superficial, I think.

2683
02:50:23,713 --> 02:50:26,507
But he does respond to feelings.

2684
02:50:26,591 --> 02:50:29,969
It took a lot of courage,
I think, to make that movie

2685
02:50:30,053 --> 02:50:35,141
and stick to his guns and do it the way
he felt it should be made.

2686
02:50:35,224 --> 02:50:38,853
It really is a masterclass in
how to shoot something

2687
02:50:38,937 --> 02:50:41,940
and not get in the way of the story

2688
02:50:42,023 --> 02:50:46,694
and not get in the way of uh,
what the character's going through.

2689
02:50:46,778 --> 02:50:50,573
<i>Okay. Show me.</i>

2690
02:50:54,535 --> 02:50:56,788
- I think he's one of the most
non-nonsense,

2691
02:50:56,871 --> 02:51:02,627
absolutely socially incorrect,
blissfully independent,

2692
02:51:02,710 --> 02:51:07,006
magnificently so, uh, filmmakers
that we can hope for.

2693
02:51:07,090 --> 02:51:07,924
<i>Plissken?</i>

2694
02:51:09,467 --> 02:51:10,843
<i>Plissken, what are you doing?</i>

2695
02:51:10,927 --> 02:51:13,972
<i>Playing with myself. I'm going in.</i>

2696
02:51:14,055 --> 02:51:17,183
Elements don't float into a story.

2697
02:51:18,810 --> 02:51:20,395
A story is a story.

2698
02:51:21,646 --> 02:51:24,399
And-- and I don't care about
other movies made.

2699
02:51:24,482 --> 02:51:26,693
Uh, I just tell a story.

2700
02:51:27,568 --> 02:51:31,114
For some reason, I wound up on this--
on this jury of this film festival.

2701
02:51:31,197 --> 02:51:36,452
And I wound up going across uh,
to uh, Europe uh, with John.

2702
02:51:36,536 --> 02:51:38,246
-Wow. -And I remember we were watching

2703
02:51:38,329 --> 02:51:41,708
this movie one day
that was in the festival.

2704
02:51:41,791 --> 02:51:45,086
It was this black and white thing
from Spain.

2705
02:51:45,169 --> 02:51:48,756
And it was a little slow
and it was a little tedious.

2706
02:51:48,840 --> 02:51:50,842
I glance over and he-- he does this.

2707
02:51:50,925 --> 02:51:54,387
He looks at his watch
and he turns to me and he says,

2708
02:51:54,470 --> 02:51:55,972
"We're 40 minutes into this.

2709
02:51:56,055 --> 02:51:59,434
If somebody doesn't die soon,
I'm gonna be really pissed off."

2710
02:52:02,687 --> 02:52:05,565
- One of the reasons why studios
get involved is when things

2711
02:52:05,648 --> 02:52:08,818
are starting to go south, financially.

2712
02:52:08,901 --> 02:52:12,530
John is-- is very conscious
of what it takes

2713
02:52:12,613 --> 02:52:13,906
and how much it's gonna cost.

2714
02:52:13,990 --> 02:52:15,992
And-- and I am as well.

2715
02:52:18,161 --> 02:52:21,748
- The only trouble I had during
the making of <i>The Thing</i>,

2716
02:52:21,831 --> 02:52:25,251
during production was,
I think I had an interview.

2717
02:52:26,294 --> 02:52:29,464
And I inadvertently, I realized
what Hollywood's like.

2718
02:52:29,547 --> 02:52:34,343
I inadvertently told the truth uh,
about how much money

2719
02:52:34,427 --> 02:52:35,970
the studio was spending.

2720
02:52:37,096 --> 02:52:40,433
And I got in trouble with--
with the head of the studio.

2721
02:52:41,392 --> 02:52:43,144
It's the wrong thing to tell the truth.

2722
02:52:43,227 --> 02:52:47,356
I should have never done that.
So I learned my lesson.

2723
02:52:47,440 --> 02:52:49,817
Otherwise, no. They didn't bother me.

2724
02:52:50,610 --> 02:52:53,821
The groundwork of the movie
was pretty solid. They liked the script.

2725
02:52:53,905 --> 02:52:57,325
So no, I don't remember there ever being
really any involvement

2726
02:52:57,408 --> 02:52:59,285
from the studio on <i>The Thing</i>.

2727
02:52:59,368 --> 02:53:02,997
Except for their disappointment at the end
when it didn't do well.

2728
02:53:03,081 --> 02:53:04,749
<i>Blair, have you seen Fuchs?</i>

2729
02:53:06,042 --> 02:53:09,545
<i>I don't want to stay out here anymore.</i>
<i>I want to come back inside.</i>

2730
02:53:09,587 --> 02:53:14,050
A recent viewing showed me that really
this movie is all about reaction shots.

2731
02:53:14,133 --> 02:53:16,844
It's all about looking into the eyes
of these people

2732
02:53:16,928 --> 02:53:19,472
and the idea that we're not sure
if they're really them.

2733
02:53:19,555 --> 02:53:21,474
<i>And I won't harm anybody.</i>

2734
02:53:21,557 --> 02:53:24,352
<i>And you've gotta let me come back inside.</i>

2735
02:53:24,435 --> 02:53:27,647
"I'm okay now. I'm--", all right.
Like, "I just want to come in."

2736
02:53:27,730 --> 02:53:31,526
You know, that is, it's so seductive
and it's so weird, right?

2737
02:53:33,653 --> 02:53:37,323
- And I love the noose in the cabin,
which is a Bill Lancaster touch, actually.

2738
02:53:37,406 --> 02:53:38,783
You know, it's Blair playing possum,

2739
02:53:38,866 --> 02:53:41,411
you know, wanting to kill himself.
It's all an act.

2740
02:53:41,494 --> 02:53:42,829
You know, and it's great.

2741
02:53:42,912 --> 02:53:46,707
But that through line, which was so clear
in the novel, I think

2742
02:53:46,791 --> 02:53:49,836
is less clear in the film,
which is why many people, I think, feel

2743
02:53:49,919 --> 02:53:52,463
that Blair was infected
once he was inside the cabin.

2744
02:53:54,632 --> 02:53:58,636
- I would argue that Brimley
being the most kind

2745
02:53:58,719 --> 02:54:00,763
of intelligent elder of the group,

2746
02:54:00,847 --> 02:54:03,307
kind of a tribal elder,
the way it was presented,

2747
02:54:03,391 --> 02:54:07,270
I think he represented the brain
of The Thing, if there was a brain.

2748
02:54:12,275 --> 02:54:14,026
<i>Anybody see Fuchs?</i>

2749
02:54:14,110 --> 02:54:16,988
I think Fuchs maybe knew or suspected
or found something

2750
02:54:17,071 --> 02:54:18,281
and then killed himself.

2751
02:54:19,657 --> 02:54:21,117
<i>Is it Fuchs?</i>

2752
02:54:24,495 --> 02:54:26,831
- I don't think Fuchs was-- was The Thing.

2753
02:54:26,914 --> 02:54:27,999
I think we gotta listen to Blair.

2754
02:54:28,082 --> 02:54:30,418
He goes, "It ain't-- it ain't Fuchs.
It ain't Fuchs."

2755
02:54:31,460 --> 02:54:32,587
<i>It ain't Fuchs.</i>

2756
02:54:32,670 --> 02:54:38,968
And there's a possibility, of course,
that Fuchs torched himself,

2757
02:54:39,051 --> 02:54:42,221
because he knew he was either becoming

2758
02:54:42,305 --> 02:54:45,016
or about to become a Thing.

2759
02:54:45,099 --> 02:54:49,520
But there's another possibility is that
Fuchs is not a man of action

2760
02:54:49,604 --> 02:54:54,650
and he's an intellectual,
kind of tried to set fire to it

2761
02:54:54,734 --> 02:54:56,402
and accidentally set fire to himself.

2762
02:54:56,485 --> 02:54:59,947
I think that's not so implausible.

2763
02:55:02,742 --> 02:55:07,788
- In the one, edited out sequence
where I think it's Fuchs

2764
02:55:07,872 --> 02:55:12,210
is killed with the shovel
and he's impaled to the door.

2765
02:55:12,293 --> 02:55:14,503
And then they took that out
and then they shot it,

2766
02:55:14,587 --> 02:55:16,589
so that he burns himself up outside.

2767
02:55:20,051 --> 02:55:22,845
"Why'd you go outside?"
Or, "How did you die?"

2768
02:55:22,929 --> 02:55:24,305
I get that a lot.

2769
02:55:24,388 --> 02:55:27,308
But I like to leave it
to other people's imaginations.

2770
02:55:27,391 --> 02:55:31,479
It's great that the--
the mysteries continue on

2771
02:55:31,562 --> 02:55:36,025
and you just see it from the point
of view of the you know,

2772
02:55:36,108 --> 02:55:39,862
of the cast and-- and you get to wonder
what happened.

2773
02:55:43,074 --> 02:55:44,158
<i>Close that door.</i>

2774
02:55:47,370 --> 02:55:48,913
<i>Where's MacReady?</i>

2775
02:55:48,996 --> 02:55:53,501
They give you enough clues to
keep debating like we still are today.

2776
02:55:53,584 --> 02:55:57,755
<i>Look. It was stashed</i>
<i>in his oil-- oil furnace.</i>

2777
02:55:57,838 --> 02:56:00,383
<i>Wind must have dislodged it,</i>
<i>but I don't think he saw me find it.</i>

2778
02:56:00,466 --> 02:56:01,926
"Who could have gotten
to MacReady's clothes

2779
02:56:02,009 --> 02:56:04,554
and burned them?
Did he-- did he Thing out?

2780
02:56:04,637 --> 02:56:07,682
Did he change out of them?
Did someone get them and try to frame him?

2781
02:56:07,765 --> 02:56:09,934
Is The Thing that calculating?"

2782
02:56:10,017 --> 02:56:11,477
So then you have to ask yourself
the question.

2783
02:56:11,560 --> 02:56:14,730
"So if this takes somebody over,

2784
02:56:14,814 --> 02:56:19,944
is it clever enough to frame somebody?"

2785
02:56:20,027 --> 02:56:21,028
<i>I don't know. I wasn't there.</i>

2786
02:56:21,112 --> 02:56:24,115
<i>Which one of you disrespectful men</i>
<i>been tossing his dirty drawers</i>

2787
02:56:24,198 --> 02:56:26,617
<i>in the kitchen trash can? Huh?</i>

2788
02:56:26,701 --> 02:56:28,869
<i>From now on, I want my kitchen clean.</i>
<i>All right?</i>

2789
02:56:28,953 --> 02:56:32,081
- I don't think it's trying to get us
to think that it's MacReady.

2790
02:56:32,164 --> 02:56:35,084
They need to make the characters think
it's MacReady.

2791
02:56:35,167 --> 02:56:38,170
And the simplest way to do that
is the torn clothes.

2792
02:56:38,254 --> 02:56:40,715
<i>-MacReady?</i>
<i>-He's one of 'em.</i>

2793
02:56:40,798 --> 02:56:42,925
<i>-When do you think it got to him?</i>
<i>-I don't know.</i>

2794
02:56:43,009 --> 02:56:45,678
<i>Could have been anytime. Anywhere.</i>

2795
02:56:45,761 --> 02:56:49,432
One of my favorite shots ever is
when T.K. Carter

2796
02:56:49,515 --> 02:56:51,684
is on his knees when he's just come in
from the storm

2797
02:56:51,767 --> 02:56:54,729
and you know, the camera
just moves past him subtly

2798
02:56:54,812 --> 02:56:57,815
to the doorknob turning
and it's like, "Oh God."

2799
02:56:59,066 --> 02:56:59,942
<i>Shh!</i>

2800
02:57:01,902 --> 02:57:03,362
<i>-Let's open it. -Hell no.</i>

2801
02:57:03,446 --> 02:57:07,283
That gave me such a thrill
when I-- when I saw it.

2802
02:57:07,366 --> 02:57:09,368
And-- and-- and I just watched
the movie of course recently

2803
02:57:09,452 --> 02:57:11,620
and I was waiting for that shot
and it had the same effect

2804
02:57:11,704 --> 02:57:13,581
on me that it did then.

2805
02:57:13,664 --> 02:57:17,543
You know, there's just so much about
the movie that that is right.

2806
02:57:17,626 --> 02:57:19,462
<i>Nothing human could have made it back</i>
<i>here in this weather</i>

2807
02:57:19,545 --> 02:57:21,255
<i>-without a guideline.</i>
<i>-Let's open it now!</i>

2808
02:57:21,339 --> 02:57:22,673
<i>Why are you so damned anxious</i>
<i>to let him in here?</i>

2809
02:57:22,757 --> 02:57:24,467
<i>'Cause it's so close.</i>
<i>Maybe our best chance</i>

2810
02:57:24,550 --> 02:57:25,593
<i>-to blow it away.</i>
<i>-No.</i>

2811
02:57:25,676 --> 02:57:29,472
Childs was like the strong silent type,
you know what I mean?

2812
02:57:29,555 --> 02:57:31,390
He didn't-- didn't have a whole--

2813
02:57:31,474 --> 02:57:33,934
He spoke when he spoke,
but didn't have a whole lot

2814
02:57:34,018 --> 02:57:35,311
to say, listened a lot.

2815
02:57:38,272 --> 02:57:39,648
- You got to love Childs.

2816
02:57:39,732 --> 02:57:41,692
He's the audience avatar in a lot of ways.

2817
02:57:41,776 --> 02:57:44,737
<i>I just cannot believe</i>
<i>any of this voodoo bullshit.</i>

2818
02:57:44,820 --> 02:57:46,530
- He kind of can't believe it.

2819
02:57:46,614 --> 02:57:48,491
And he's asking the obvious questions
that the audience

2820
02:57:48,574 --> 02:57:50,117
is probably yelling at the screen.

2821
02:57:50,201 --> 02:57:51,952
<i>You believe any of this voodoo bullshit,</i>
<i>Blair?</i>

2822
02:57:52,036 --> 02:57:53,871
And he's like, he's like, "How's this
motherfucker wake up in the ice?"

2823
02:57:53,954 --> 02:57:55,414
<i>Now how's this motherfucker</i>
<i>wake up after thousands</i>

2824
02:57:55,498 --> 02:57:56,415
<i>of years in the ice?</i>

2825
02:57:56,499 --> 02:58:00,419
He's not putting any floral, uh,
you know, language on it.

2826
02:58:00,503 --> 02:58:03,381
He's just like,
"What the hell is happening?"

2827
02:58:03,464 --> 02:58:05,132
<i>It's a crock of shit.</i>

2828
02:58:05,216 --> 02:58:10,012
An alpha male. He's the only other person
apart from MacReady

2829
02:58:10,096 --> 02:58:12,932
who you could see taking charge.

2830
02:58:13,015 --> 02:58:15,893
<i>Childs! What if we're wrong about him?</i>

2831
02:58:15,976 --> 02:58:17,269
<i>Well, then, we're wrong.</i>

2832
02:58:17,353 --> 02:58:20,773
He and MacReady are kind of like
opposite numbers.

2833
02:58:22,858 --> 02:58:26,237
I think he's the prototype
for a certain kind uh, of character

2834
02:58:26,320 --> 02:58:29,698
in these ensembles uh, that is,
with good reason,

2835
02:58:29,782 --> 02:58:31,283
repeated often throughout the genre.

2836
02:58:33,077 --> 02:58:36,580
Oh, man. I'm a huge fan of--
of Keith David uh,

2837
02:58:36,664 --> 02:58:39,125
and another John Carpenter stalwart.

2838
02:58:39,208 --> 02:58:40,709
<i>Look, you crazy mother!</i>

2839
02:58:40,793 --> 02:58:43,212
<i>-Put these on! -Hey! Stay away from me!</i>

2840
02:58:43,254 --> 02:58:45,214
<i>I'm telling you, you dumb son of a bitch!</i>

2841
02:58:46,215 --> 02:58:49,760
I love him and--
and I love uh, his defiance.

2842
02:58:52,930 --> 02:58:55,057
<i>Damn it! He's got the keys.</i>

2843
02:58:55,975 --> 02:59:00,563
He's had a great career.
He's-- so he's a powerful actor.

2844
02:59:00,646 --> 02:59:04,400
Really, really, I just had a-- good--
really good guy.

2845
02:59:06,944 --> 02:59:09,989
For me, it was a particularly
unique experience,

2846
02:59:10,072 --> 02:59:11,740
because it was my first movie.

2847
02:59:12,825 --> 02:59:15,202
There were two readings, two auditions,

2848
02:59:15,286 --> 02:59:18,914
and the first one I read
just by myself, I think.

2849
02:59:18,998 --> 02:59:23,669
And then, we were in a room
with all, you know,

2850
02:59:23,752 --> 02:59:27,298
several other New York actors who--
who I was very familiar with.

2851
02:59:27,381 --> 02:59:28,549
It was like a fight scene.

2852
02:59:28,632 --> 02:59:32,094
Somebody hit somebody
or there was a physical altercation

2853
02:59:32,178 --> 02:59:34,346
in this moment that we're reading.

2854
02:59:34,430 --> 02:59:37,266
When we get to this fight moment,

2855
02:59:37,349 --> 02:59:41,979
I don't remember who the actor was,
but he, in order to--

2856
02:59:42,062 --> 02:59:45,649
in order to demonstrate this fight moment,

2857
02:59:45,733 --> 02:59:48,527
he took whatever that was
on the producer's desk,

2858
02:59:48,611 --> 02:59:52,531
including the phone.
He just went, whoosh! And…

2859
02:59:56,869 --> 03:00:00,039
Everything on the man's desk went flying.

2860
03:00:00,080 --> 03:00:03,417
So Keith and I had gone
to acting school together.

2861
03:00:03,501 --> 03:00:07,505
We had a few extracurricular activities
that we engaged in

2862
03:00:07,588 --> 03:00:10,424
on the stairwells of Juilliard.

2863
03:00:10,508 --> 03:00:12,384
And we looked at each other the first day
and we're like,

2864
03:00:12,468 --> 03:00:15,221
"What the fuck are you doing here?"

2865
03:00:15,304 --> 03:00:18,098
It was fascinating.
I'd never been on a soundstage before.

2866
03:00:19,892 --> 03:00:24,939
Um, I only sort of remember seeing it
in Sunset Boulevard, you know?

2867
03:00:25,022 --> 03:00:30,861
And uh, so that-- that was,
it was actually fascinating

2868
03:00:30,945 --> 03:00:34,823
to see, you know, 30-foot ceilings

2869
03:00:34,907 --> 03:00:39,787
or I think there were 30 feet, you know,
there was just, I mean, wow.

2870
03:00:41,330 --> 03:00:43,916
- He's a fantastic actor.

2871
03:00:43,999 --> 03:00:46,544
And he can do anything, like Kurt.

2872
03:00:47,378 --> 03:00:51,090
He can play comedy. He can play d-- drama.

2873
03:00:51,173 --> 03:00:54,760
I mean, amazing guy. And he was wonderful.

2874
03:00:59,765 --> 03:01:03,727
He was chasing women
like nobody's business

2875
03:01:03,811 --> 03:01:06,063
up in Stewart, Columbia. Oh, man.

2876
03:01:07,356 --> 03:01:11,318
Yeah, but that's okay.
I-- I-- Everybody was chasing women.

2877
03:01:11,402 --> 03:01:17,324
But uh, it's grim on a--
on a all-male set,

2878
03:01:17,408 --> 03:01:21,245
let me tell you guys.
It's grim for all of us.

2879
03:01:23,205 --> 03:01:24,748
<i>Come on, Childs. Burn me.</i>

2880
03:01:26,875 --> 03:01:29,086
<i>Put those torches on the floor</i>
<i>and back off.</i>

2881
03:01:29,169 --> 03:01:31,880
I loved all the characters in it,
but Keith David

2882
03:01:31,964 --> 03:01:33,966
has always been like a special
standout to me.

2883
03:01:34,049 --> 03:01:35,634
-What an actor.
-What an actor.

2884
03:01:35,718 --> 03:01:37,553
<i>Well, that's Uncle Sam for you, baby.</i>

2885
03:01:39,597 --> 03:01:41,348
<i>Money to burn.</i>

2886
03:01:41,432 --> 03:01:44,810
- I saw an interview with him once,
and he said that after <i>The Thing</i>, uh,

2887
03:01:44,893 --> 03:01:48,230
he didn't get another movie role
for four years.

2888
03:01:48,314 --> 03:01:50,190
And I think the next movie role he got was

2889
03:01:50,274 --> 03:01:52,484
another John Carpenter movie,
was <i>They Live</i>.

2890
03:01:52,568 --> 03:01:54,695
<i>Wait, boys, wait.</i>
<i>You're making a big mistake.</i>

2891
03:01:56,238 --> 03:01:57,364
<i>You made the mistake.</i>

2892
03:01:57,448 --> 03:01:58,616
Hollywood sucks, man.

2893
03:01:58,699 --> 03:02:02,369
I mean, for an actor
of that kind of power and-- and--

2894
03:02:02,453 --> 03:02:05,247
and-- and a screen presence
with that kind of charisma.

2895
03:02:05,331 --> 03:02:06,915
-And training.
-To-- and training.

2896
03:02:06,999 --> 03:02:10,044
To not be working all the time
is is a crime.

2897
03:02:14,214 --> 03:02:16,884
<i>-You asshole.</i>
<i>-You'd have done the same thing.</i>

2898
03:02:16,967 --> 03:02:21,180
You're always wondering, you know,
is he got a level of strength,

2899
03:02:21,263 --> 03:02:23,307
because he's consistently a good guy,

2900
03:02:23,390 --> 03:02:25,851
or does he have a level of strength,
because he--

2901
03:02:25,934 --> 03:02:28,479
he is the alien and could basically
consume everybody?

2902
03:02:28,562 --> 03:02:29,521
We don't know.

2903
03:02:31,857 --> 03:02:33,525
<i>Now nobody gets out of my sight.</i>

2904
03:02:47,498 --> 03:02:48,540
<i>-Clear.</i>
<i>-Clear.</i>

2905
03:03:08,560 --> 03:03:11,855
Every so often,
he stops and clutches his chest

2906
03:03:11,939 --> 03:03:14,191
and you think, "Oh, no. Oh, dear.

2907
03:03:18,946 --> 03:03:21,865
I think that Norris has been fully
absorbed and imitated.

2908
03:03:23,158 --> 03:03:26,120
And in imitating Norris,
<i>The Thing</i> has imitated a body

2909
03:03:26,203 --> 03:03:27,913
that was not long for this world.

2910
03:03:27,996 --> 03:03:28,914
<i>Where's the rest?</i>

2911
03:03:33,460 --> 03:03:37,047
Norris, whether human or imitation,
was probably going

2912
03:03:37,131 --> 03:03:38,590
to have a heart attack that week.

2913
03:03:42,761 --> 03:03:49,601
For me, the most shocking,
thrilling, unexpected,

2914
03:03:49,685 --> 03:03:55,065
memory-searing sequence has got to be
the scene where Norris

2915
03:03:55,149 --> 03:03:58,777
is taken in and they're gonna do
the defibrillator.

2916
03:03:58,861 --> 03:04:00,904
<i>Windows, wheel that defibrillator</i>
<i>over here.</i>

2917
03:04:01,655 --> 03:04:05,200
It's a masterpiece in itself,
that whole sequence.

2918
03:04:05,284 --> 03:04:07,703
That, to me, is the signature scene

2919
03:04:07,786 --> 03:04:09,371
-of the entire movie.
- Yeah.

2920
03:04:12,249 --> 03:04:16,754
There's enough effects in that scene
to last anybody else a full feature.

2921
03:04:16,837 --> 03:04:18,005
Yeah, that's right.

2922
03:04:18,088 --> 03:04:20,549
"We'll do this on the first act.
We'll do that on the second act.

2923
03:04:20,632 --> 03:04:22,718
No, no, no.
Let's do it all in four minutes."

2924
03:04:22,801 --> 03:04:24,511
-Yeah. -"All right."

2925
03:04:25,429 --> 03:04:26,305
-Yeah.
-And bam.

2926
03:04:26,388 --> 03:04:28,348
And I think that is one of the things that

2927
03:04:28,432 --> 03:04:31,810
-in the '80s didn't sit well.
-Hm.

2928
03:04:31,894 --> 03:04:34,480
Like, people thought it was a bit much.

2929
03:04:36,023 --> 03:04:37,691
<i>- So, you sweethearts were about</i>
<i>to have yourselves</i>

2930
03:04:37,775 --> 03:04:39,401
<i>a little lynching party, huh?</i>

2931
03:04:40,194 --> 03:04:45,991
Each part of that was a separate,
dedicated, discreet effect.

2932
03:04:46,074 --> 03:04:50,621
A lot of 'em were shot separately
and then cut together to make it work.

2933
03:04:50,704 --> 03:04:53,916
So we could get better control
of the uh, puppets.

2934
03:04:54,917 --> 03:04:57,586
- Rob didn't let anybody take photos
in the shop.

2935
03:04:57,669 --> 03:05:00,881
Never allowed any of his crew people
to take photos.

2936
03:05:00,964 --> 03:05:02,424
And this was before the internet.

2937
03:05:02,508 --> 03:05:04,760
This was before everybody
would take a picture

2938
03:05:04,843 --> 03:05:07,346
and then five minutes later it's online.

2939
03:05:07,429 --> 03:05:12,100
So there was a-- a very,
very concerted effort

2940
03:05:12,184 --> 03:05:15,312
to keep a veil of secrecy around
what was being built.

2941
03:05:17,564 --> 03:05:20,442
- Where Norris is on the table
getting defibrillated

2942
03:05:20,526 --> 03:05:23,070
is a great bit of misdirection,
because you're invested

2943
03:05:23,153 --> 03:05:25,072
in something else in that moment.

2944
03:05:25,155 --> 03:05:27,032
<i>I'm a real light sleeper, Childs.</i>

2945
03:05:28,992 --> 03:05:30,619
And it's also really kind of ridiculous.

2946
03:05:30,702 --> 03:05:33,664
I do think his stomach opening up
into a giant mouth with teeth

2947
03:05:33,747 --> 03:05:36,208
is very Mike Ploog.

2948
03:05:36,291 --> 03:05:39,670
Charlie Hallahan was in some pain
in that sort

2949
03:05:39,753 --> 03:05:41,922
of structure that Rob had,
you know, where his real face

2950
03:05:42,005 --> 03:05:44,508
was there prior to
where the chest blows open.

2951
03:05:46,093 --> 03:05:49,346
There was a mechanism inside
that would tear open

2952
03:05:49,429 --> 03:05:51,306
and have like shark teeth inside.

2953
03:05:54,560 --> 03:05:56,228
- Who's to say the creature is evil?

2954
03:05:56,311 --> 03:05:59,022
I think it's possibly just trying
to survive and--

2955
03:05:59,106 --> 03:06:02,985
and it reacts when it feels threatened.

2956
03:06:04,736 --> 03:06:07,990
You could, of course, make another film
from the creature's point of view.

2957
03:06:08,073 --> 03:06:10,450
I think there was a very good
short story made

2958
03:06:10,534 --> 03:06:12,244
from the creature's point of view.

2959
03:06:14,162 --> 03:06:15,998
- All modern science-fiction movies,

2960
03:06:16,081 --> 03:06:21,170
we don't necessarily worry about
the motivation of-- of monsters.

2961
03:06:22,129 --> 03:06:25,424
But The Thing wants to survive.
Just look at it that way.

2962
03:06:25,507 --> 03:06:30,179
That's its first primary,
primary purpose in its life is

2963
03:06:30,262 --> 03:06:33,849
to survive no matter what.

2964
03:06:33,932 --> 03:06:36,018
And it-- it does a pretty good job.

2965
03:06:37,185 --> 03:06:38,437
<i>-Clear.</i>
<i>-Clear.</i>

2966
03:06:42,274 --> 03:06:46,737
And his frickin' chest opens up
and then he bites off the--

2967
03:06:46,820 --> 03:06:49,489
the chest bites off the doctor's hands.

2968
03:06:49,573 --> 03:06:53,785
What the hell is happening?
What? No one saw that coming.

2969
03:06:59,833 --> 03:07:03,587
- Now, I created some gelatin arms
and I pre-rigged 'em

2970
03:07:03,670 --> 03:07:09,301
with dental acrylic bones,
and tubing, and layers of--

2971
03:07:09,384 --> 03:07:12,596
using anatomy book,
layers of muscle structure inside.

2972
03:07:14,056 --> 03:07:18,143
When we shot it, I was on a scaffolding

2973
03:07:18,226 --> 03:07:20,896
suspended above the torso.

2974
03:07:20,979 --> 03:07:24,483
And I twisted and ripped the arms
and the flesh.

2975
03:07:26,568 --> 03:07:28,820
The first take is in the film.

2976
03:07:28,904 --> 03:07:31,281
John Carpenter was on the B camera.

2977
03:07:31,365 --> 03:07:35,577
He said cut after the first take.
He goes, "Yikes."

2978
03:07:35,661 --> 03:07:37,663
I said, "John", and I told him about

2979
03:07:37,746 --> 03:07:39,665
the experience I had on
<i>My Bloody Valentine</i>.

2980
03:07:39,748 --> 03:07:41,792
The Censors cut all this stuff out.

2981
03:07:41,875 --> 03:07:44,628
"I did some remarkable work on there
and it all got cut out."

2982
03:07:44,711 --> 03:07:46,463
He goes, "I'll get it in."

2983
03:07:49,466 --> 03:07:52,094
I'd say my favorite practical effect

2984
03:07:52,177 --> 03:07:55,222
is when Richard Dysart
gets his arms chopped off

2985
03:07:55,305 --> 03:07:56,932
by the chest monster.

2986
03:07:57,015 --> 03:07:59,059
And then finding out
that the actual arms were

2987
03:07:59,142 --> 03:08:02,813
of a-- a double amputee that they used.

2988
03:08:04,564 --> 03:08:08,443
- We took a mold of-- of our actor
in the grimacing expression

2989
03:08:08,527 --> 03:08:12,114
and created a mask that was custom fitted
to this amputee double.

2990
03:08:13,740 --> 03:08:16,952
We had a-- a gentleman
who was a crane operator.

2991
03:08:17,035 --> 03:08:21,164
I guess he uh, he had worked at Universal,
I think, at one point.

2992
03:08:21,248 --> 03:08:24,167
He had mechanical arms
that he could work with.

2993
03:08:25,377 --> 03:08:29,423
It freaked us all out that this guy
was having stubs

2994
03:08:29,506 --> 03:08:34,302
put onto his arm with--
with these bulbs filled with blood

2995
03:08:34,386 --> 03:08:36,263
that were gonna be squirting blood. He--

2996
03:08:36,346 --> 03:08:39,808
This is how he lost his arms
in an industrial accident.

2997
03:08:39,891 --> 03:08:41,685
And he was so happy to be there.

2998
03:08:41,768 --> 03:08:44,354
He just thought it was the greatest thing
in the world.

2999
03:08:44,438 --> 03:08:47,190
But we were like,
"Oh my God, this is so inappropriate.

3000
03:08:47,274 --> 03:08:48,525
Why are we doing this to him?"

3001
03:08:51,278 --> 03:08:55,782
There's this volcanic eruption
that comes out of Norris' chest.

3002
03:08:55,866 --> 03:09:00,704
And the entrails come flying out.
And this undu-- undulating lips.

3003
03:09:08,295 --> 03:09:13,050
Up on the ceiling,
is a demonic twisted aberration

3004
03:09:13,133 --> 03:09:15,844
of the Norris character.

3005
03:09:20,932 --> 03:09:22,684
Jeez, it looks-- it looks like a-- a--

3006
03:09:22,768 --> 03:09:26,855
an insane-- a medieval painting
or something.

3007
03:09:28,982 --> 03:09:32,986
- Had to paint it.
Paint all this stuff hanging down.

3008
03:09:33,070 --> 03:09:36,907
And then all of that,
that caterpillar neck

3009
03:09:36,990 --> 03:09:40,994
and the head, all of that had to be
uh, fine red hair punched

3010
03:09:41,078 --> 03:09:42,120
into all of that.

3011
03:09:42,204 --> 03:09:45,332
And that's like one of my favorite pieces.

3012
03:09:46,792 --> 03:09:50,170
I rigged it up on the ceiling
and Art Pimentel, he was our--

3013
03:09:50,253 --> 03:09:52,297
he was the smallest guy
on the-- on the crew,

3014
03:09:52,380 --> 03:09:55,092
he was up in the ductwork
puppeteering that.

3015
03:09:58,178 --> 03:10:03,725
I had the really good pleasure
of seeing all the props

3016
03:10:03,809 --> 03:10:05,560
from <i>The Thing</i>, all the creature stuff

3017
03:10:05,644 --> 03:10:11,149
in Henry Alvarez's workshop,
in the early '90s.

3018
03:10:11,233 --> 03:10:15,654
And in the back of his studio,
he had the Blair monster,

3019
03:10:15,737 --> 03:10:18,198
he had the Norris monster.

3020
03:10:18,281 --> 03:10:21,868
They had really decomposed
pretty significantly because

3021
03:10:21,952 --> 03:10:26,373
a lot of the K-Y Jelly that
they would put on the creatures

3022
03:10:26,456 --> 03:10:29,835
just dissolved the foam latex.

3023
03:10:29,918 --> 03:10:33,839
But the first and foremost thing
that I found really surprising

3024
03:10:33,922 --> 03:10:35,298
is how small they were.

3025
03:10:35,382 --> 03:10:39,052
Because when Norris' chest opens up,

3026
03:10:39,136 --> 03:10:42,514
and that big creature comes out,
and its legs are holding onto

3027
03:10:42,597 --> 03:10:45,183
the air-conditioning vent,
you imagine that thing

3028
03:10:45,267 --> 03:10:49,771
being 12, 14 feet tall.
It was about 6 feet tall.

3029
03:10:51,022 --> 03:10:53,358
They were playing with perspective.

3030
03:10:53,441 --> 03:10:58,822
Unfortunately, not long after that,
all those pieces were destroyed.

3031
03:10:58,905 --> 03:11:03,994
Um, but I was really lucky enough
to see what was left

3032
03:11:04,077 --> 03:11:05,370
of those pieces in person.

3033
03:11:05,453 --> 03:11:07,747
I don't know very many people
that had ever seen them.

3034
03:11:09,249 --> 03:11:12,711
- It was all Rob's ideas.
That was all Rob's stuff.

3035
03:11:12,794 --> 03:11:15,338
He had a very fertile imagination.

3036
03:11:19,176 --> 03:11:23,972
- Then he had a bunch of heads,
because they had to come off the table.

3037
03:11:24,055 --> 03:11:25,640
So I had to paint all those heads.

3038
03:11:27,434 --> 03:11:29,811
- In the storyboards,
there was all these little

3039
03:11:29,895 --> 03:11:32,272
stretching tendons and pops.

3040
03:11:33,523 --> 03:11:38,987
Boxes of Bubble Yum bubble gum
were being stockpiled on the shelves.

3041
03:11:40,488 --> 03:11:44,993
- You see all those weird bulbous pieces
of flesh that are green.

3042
03:11:45,076 --> 03:11:46,119
They're not red.

3043
03:11:46,203 --> 03:11:48,079
There's no blood in that scene,
which I think

3044
03:11:48,163 --> 03:11:52,459
is a direct contrast
to the Palmer scene later.

3045
03:11:54,461 --> 03:11:57,130
We painted up the entrails
that were inside the neck.

3046
03:11:57,214 --> 03:12:00,800
It was like a,
it was all this like webbing

3047
03:12:00,884 --> 03:12:03,303
with a little barnacle tex--
texture to it.

3048
03:12:03,386 --> 03:12:05,305
And we painted up that
with fantasy colors also.

3049
03:12:05,388 --> 03:12:07,557
We were trying to avoid the X rating.

3050
03:12:08,683 --> 03:12:11,645
- And we were pumping different materials,

3051
03:12:11,728 --> 03:12:15,065
flammable materials that gave
a nice stringy look to 'em.

3052
03:12:15,148 --> 03:12:17,275
John Carpenter goes,
"Hey guys, wait a minute.

3053
03:12:17,359 --> 03:12:20,820
At this point, the duct monster
has been burned up

3054
03:12:20,904 --> 03:12:22,948
and it's fallen onto the floor.

3055
03:12:23,031 --> 03:12:25,951
So we should have a flame
in front of the lens,

3056
03:12:26,034 --> 03:12:28,995
at the bottom of the lens." "Okay."

3057
03:12:30,830 --> 03:12:33,041
- We need the fire bar here.

3058
03:12:33,124 --> 03:12:35,877
And he brought it, they put it out
in front of the camera.

3059
03:12:36,836 --> 03:12:41,341
And-- and they, he used uh, uh,
like a barbecue lighter to light it up.

3060
03:12:41,424 --> 03:12:43,426
A blue flame went…

3061
03:12:44,344 --> 03:12:46,680
Because the fumes
had built up in the room.

3062
03:12:46,763 --> 03:12:51,768
Rob s-- stands, takes a step back
goes, "It's on fire."

3063
03:12:53,436 --> 03:12:56,314
And I took my arm and swept it
across the uh, chest

3064
03:12:56,398 --> 03:13:00,026
and just left a trail of ash
across the chest.

3065
03:13:02,862 --> 03:13:06,574
- They ran and pulled a puppeteer out
from under the table.

3066
03:13:06,658 --> 03:13:08,702
Fire extinguishers are out…

3067
03:13:08,785 --> 03:13:11,037
Doing the whole--
the whole business, put it out.

3068
03:13:11,121 --> 03:13:15,083
John Carpenter goes,
"Oh, how long-- how long

3069
03:13:15,166 --> 03:13:16,626
that's gonna take to reset?"

3070
03:13:20,839 --> 03:13:25,760
The head hits the ground
and it's still cognizant.

3071
03:13:30,640 --> 03:13:36,104
And it moves itself across the floor
and it's just trying to escape.

3072
03:13:38,023 --> 03:13:39,274
That might be one of my favorites.

3073
03:13:39,357 --> 03:13:43,611
Because it's such an amazing likeness
of the actor.

3074
03:13:43,695 --> 03:13:48,575
And the facial expressions
and the grimacing is completely alive.

3075
03:13:48,658 --> 03:13:49,993
It still looks like the character,

3076
03:13:50,076 --> 03:13:53,580
but then every time you see it
and you cut back, it's like,

3077
03:13:53,663 --> 03:13:56,583
it looks like him, but it's not him.

3078
03:13:56,666 --> 03:13:58,293
It's somehow evolved.

3079
03:13:59,461 --> 03:14:02,630
The Thing here, I think, is thinking,
"How can I get away?"

3080
03:14:02,714 --> 03:14:07,510
Uh, and it comes up with the idea
of sprouting spider legs.

3081
03:14:13,391 --> 03:14:18,271
Maybe it's absorbed some spider-like alien
on another planet.

3082
03:14:18,355 --> 03:14:22,692
Or-- or maybe it's already encountered
a spider on Earth,

3083
03:14:22,776 --> 03:14:25,945
um, either in the ice,
if there are spiders in the ice,

3084
03:14:26,029 --> 03:14:29,157
or-- or perhaps at the uh, outpost.

3085
03:14:29,240 --> 03:14:31,201
And then goes… [imitates spider]

3086
03:14:31,284 --> 03:14:34,704
And-- and hides for a while
under a desk, breathing.

3087
03:14:34,788 --> 03:14:37,248
And its breaths go… [imitates breathing]

3088
03:14:37,332 --> 03:14:38,375
And then goes off.

3089
03:14:40,418 --> 03:14:43,129
The remote control head, the spider head,

3090
03:14:43,213 --> 03:14:46,508
they had a little camshaft
that operated the legs.

3091
03:14:46,591 --> 03:14:50,845
It's a motorized radio control device
that-- that has got

3092
03:14:50,929 --> 03:14:54,182
a little, you know,
cart on wheels underneath 'em

3093
03:14:54,265 --> 03:14:57,685
to have 'em scoot.
And everything is synchronized.

3094
03:14:57,769 --> 03:15:01,481
The legs and the uh, movement
are all-- is all synchronized

3095
03:15:01,564 --> 03:15:04,776
to look like it's propelling itself.

3096
03:15:06,361 --> 03:15:08,905
- The spider head
is certainly my favorite.

3097
03:15:08,988 --> 03:15:12,450
I have a casting from the original
mold of that

3098
03:15:12,534 --> 03:15:15,245
that I've had, you know,
it's been sitting in my house.

3099
03:15:15,328 --> 03:15:19,457
I actually just recently
in the last six months decided

3100
03:15:19,541 --> 03:15:24,712
to rebuild the legs and-- and rework it,
'cause I didn't love the hair on it.

3101
03:15:24,796 --> 03:15:27,424
And I even said to John,
"Look, I have, you know,

3102
03:15:27,507 --> 03:15:30,802
I can scan this thing for you
and make you a spider head

3103
03:15:30,885 --> 03:15:32,429
if you want one."

3104
03:15:32,512 --> 03:15:34,848
He just was like,
"I'll get back to you on that."

3105
03:15:37,976 --> 03:15:40,812
<i>You've got to be fucking kidding.</i>

3106
03:15:41,980 --> 03:15:43,690
"Got to be fucking kidding me."

3107
03:15:43,773 --> 03:15:46,359
He's like-- it was-- it was, you know,

3108
03:15:46,443 --> 03:15:48,987
when you could see this puppet thing
working, you-- you went,

3109
03:15:49,070 --> 03:15:50,572
"Oh, that's-- that's great."

3110
03:15:50,655 --> 03:15:52,157
"You've got to be fucking
kidding me, right?"

3111
03:15:52,240 --> 03:15:54,784
I mean, it's-- that's the reaction
the audience is having.

3112
03:15:54,868 --> 03:15:57,078
That's why that line is so great.

3113
03:15:57,162 --> 03:16:01,207
Because it's like, it-- you know,
Palmer says the one thing

3114
03:16:01,291 --> 03:16:04,252
that's going through the audience's head
when that happens, right?

3115
03:16:04,335 --> 03:16:07,797
I should have known this is a great line.

3116
03:16:07,881 --> 03:16:11,050
It's perfectly timed in the script.

3117
03:16:12,093 --> 03:16:17,015
You've had this tour de force
of practical,

3118
03:16:17,098 --> 03:16:21,102
real effects happening before your eyes.

3119
03:16:22,645 --> 03:16:25,982
You've had this very
frightening experience,

3120
03:16:26,065 --> 03:16:30,487
this transformation of Charlie Hallahan.

3121
03:16:31,571 --> 03:16:36,409
And it's scary, but it's also extreme.

3122
03:16:36,493 --> 03:16:39,954
It's-- it's like a Grand Guignol.

3123
03:16:40,038 --> 03:16:42,790
It's operatic, almost.

3124
03:16:42,874 --> 03:16:47,545
I think the audience is saying, "Come on."

3125
03:16:49,631 --> 03:16:55,803
But it's very important to me that
when John shot that scene,

3126
03:16:55,887 --> 03:17:00,725
he got the-- all the shots that he wanted,
and he was ready to move on.

3127
03:17:00,808 --> 03:17:04,187
And Richard Masur said something to him.

3128
03:17:04,270 --> 03:17:06,314
I said, "Wait a minute." He said, "What?"

3129
03:17:07,357 --> 03:17:10,443
I said, "You didn't get Clennon
saying the line."

3130
03:17:10,527 --> 03:17:11,778
He said, "Oh, no, no, no.

3131
03:17:11,861 --> 03:17:14,489
That line's gonna play over the head
going out the door."

3132
03:17:14,572 --> 03:17:19,410
I said, "John, you have to get Clennon
saying the line.

3133
03:17:20,161 --> 03:17:22,455
You have to do it."
And he's going, "No, Richard, look."

3134
03:17:22,539 --> 03:17:24,123
And he gets out the storyboard,

3135
03:17:24,207 --> 03:17:26,793
and he's showing me
how the line is written.

3136
03:17:26,876 --> 03:17:30,004
I said, "I don't give a fuck
what that says. Shoot it.

3137
03:17:30,088 --> 03:17:33,258
If you don't shoot it, you will regret it
for the rest of your life."

3138
03:17:33,341 --> 03:17:36,427
And John was a little annoyed,
I think, at first,

3139
03:17:36,511 --> 03:17:41,432
perhaps that Richard
would have the uh, the nerve

3140
03:17:41,516 --> 03:17:45,603
to tell John Carpenter
how to shoot a scene.

3141
03:17:45,687 --> 03:17:48,273
He said, "All right, fine, fuck, Dean,
go ahead, shoot it.

3142
03:17:48,356 --> 03:17:50,233
Line it up." And we were already led.

3143
03:17:50,316 --> 03:17:53,069
It was-- it was a matter
of clearing everybody.

3144
03:17:53,152 --> 03:17:56,114
<i>You've got to be fucking kidding.</i>

3145
03:17:56,197 --> 03:17:59,784
Okay? The biggest laugh
in the movie, the--

3146
03:17:59,867 --> 03:18:02,453
one of the most memorable moments
in the movie,

3147
03:18:02,537 --> 03:18:04,581
and John wasn't gonna shoot it.

3148
03:18:05,957 --> 03:18:10,336
John's instincts about
what makes a movie a movie

3149
03:18:10,420 --> 03:18:13,548
and what makes people react to the movie

3150
03:18:13,631 --> 03:18:18,469
and the way he's hoping
they'll react are far superior to mine.

3151
03:18:18,553 --> 03:18:22,682
But I know some stuff,
and that was one of the things I knew.

3152
03:18:24,559 --> 03:18:28,354
- When I go to conventions
and I meet the fans

3153
03:18:28,438 --> 03:18:32,483
and they bring a poster
or a photograph to me

3154
03:18:32,567 --> 03:18:37,322
or uh, an album cover to--
to autograph it, they say,

3155
03:18:38,865 --> 03:18:41,034
"Would you write that line after it?"

3156
03:18:42,201 --> 03:18:45,496
It crystallizes something for the fans.

3157
03:18:45,580 --> 03:18:52,545
That line captures something
about the powerful effect

3158
03:18:52,629 --> 03:18:57,508
of the special effects makeup,
uh, the special visual effects

3159
03:18:57,592 --> 03:18:59,344
that Rob Bottin did.

3160
03:18:59,427 --> 03:19:01,095
And then we burn the hell out of it.

3161
03:19:07,352 --> 03:19:10,188
Apparently, it still worked
uh-- I-- after that.

3162
03:19:10,271 --> 03:19:14,359
I think it-- it was able
to kind of limp along.

3163
03:19:22,450 --> 03:19:27,872
What an insane sequence that could, could,

3164
03:19:27,955 --> 03:19:32,919
and kind of is, comical.
It walks a fine line.

3165
03:19:35,838 --> 03:19:37,256
I think the best way to experience
this scene

3166
03:19:37,340 --> 03:19:38,758
after you've seen the film
for the first time,

3167
03:19:38,841 --> 03:19:41,386
is to watch it with Carpenter
and Russell's commentary.

3168
03:19:41,469 --> 03:19:42,929
Because Russell is just howling.

3169
03:19:43,012 --> 03:19:45,390
He's just cackling through
this whole sequence.

3170
03:19:45,473 --> 03:19:48,226
And I think it's a good example
of how it's okay to laugh

3171
03:19:48,309 --> 03:19:51,813
at some really horrifying horror.

3172
03:19:51,896 --> 03:19:56,275
To me, what I like about
some of the monster stuff is,

3173
03:19:56,359 --> 03:20:00,530
is his sense of humor that's in--
that he's infused in there.

3174
03:20:00,613 --> 03:20:03,991
It's horrifically funny, you know?

3175
03:20:05,868 --> 03:20:08,538
- It was shot in such a way
that you never held on it

3176
03:20:08,621 --> 03:20:09,831
or featured it too long,

3177
03:20:09,914 --> 03:20:12,000
because I don't think John
ever really wanted you

3178
03:20:12,083 --> 03:20:16,254
to put together in your head
what it was, what it was like.

3179
03:20:16,337 --> 03:20:21,467
Um, so it really sort of
allowed there to be this

3180
03:20:23,136 --> 03:20:27,515
almost fanatical obsession
with understanding

3181
03:20:27,598 --> 03:20:31,227
who this guy Rob Bottin was
and how they filmed it.

3182
03:20:32,520 --> 03:20:36,607
- I don't know, he was massive. He looked
like a Yeti or something, a Bigfoot.

3183
03:20:36,691 --> 03:20:41,446
His hair, he had this shag haircut
and this giant lustrous beard.

3184
03:20:42,697 --> 03:20:44,657
- Rob Bottin is an enigma.

3185
03:20:44,741 --> 03:20:50,163
He's one of those people
that will go down in the annals

3186
03:20:50,246 --> 03:20:51,497
of filmmaking.

3187
03:20:52,623 --> 03:20:57,754
Elusive, brilliant, funny,
a little insecure,

3188
03:20:57,837 --> 03:21:02,300
groundbreaking,
and uh, very, very personal.

3189
03:21:02,383 --> 03:21:06,596
He's kind of revered
as one of the greatest ever.

3190
03:21:06,679 --> 03:21:07,972
Because of that movie.

3191
03:21:08,055 --> 03:21:10,516
He was in his own special world
with it, you know?

3192
03:21:10,600 --> 03:21:13,519
Nobody-- we didn't-- we were just--

3193
03:21:13,603 --> 03:21:16,731
We'd watch him sometimes,
get it ready, and keep adding,

3194
03:21:16,814 --> 03:21:18,191
keep adding the goo.

3195
03:21:18,274 --> 03:21:22,153
When I met him the first time,
I gave him a Big Daddy Roth--

3196
03:21:22,236 --> 03:21:23,362
-Oh, did you?
-Model kit.

3197
03:21:23,446 --> 03:21:24,781
And he said, "How did you know?" I said--

3198
03:21:24,864 --> 03:21:27,366
-Oh, come on.
-"What do you mean how did I know?"

3199
03:21:27,450 --> 03:21:28,534
How could you not know?

3200
03:21:30,161 --> 03:21:33,539
- And I've got his number through
the Corman folks, you know,

3201
03:21:33,623 --> 03:21:36,167
and I called him, and he had an assistant

3202
03:21:36,250 --> 03:21:37,335
who picked up the phone.

3203
03:21:37,418 --> 03:21:40,797
"Yes." "I said, hi, hi, is--
is Rob Bottin in?"

3204
03:21:40,880 --> 03:21:43,049
And she said,
"Yes, may I ask who's calling?"

3205
03:21:43,132 --> 03:21:47,094
And I said, "It's Alec Gillis."
And she said, "Oh, yes, hold on."

3206
03:21:47,178 --> 03:21:52,266
And Rob gets on the phone,
very kind of trepidatious, says,

3207
03:21:52,350 --> 03:21:54,435
"Hello, this is Rob."

3208
03:21:54,519 --> 03:21:56,938
And I said, "Hey, Rob, it's Alec Gillis."

3209
03:21:57,021 --> 03:22:00,483
And he goes, "Oh, shit.
She told me it was Alec Guinness."

3210
03:22:02,485 --> 03:22:05,321
I went to ask for a job
and he was doing <i>Total Recall</i>.

3211
03:22:05,404 --> 03:22:08,616
I-- I had my company,
I was preparing to do <i>Cronos</i>.

3212
03:22:08,699 --> 03:22:11,494
I was trying to learn everything I could
about makeup effects.

3213
03:22:11,577 --> 03:22:16,457
Dick Smith recommended me
and I went to uh, Churubusco Studios

3214
03:22:16,541 --> 03:22:19,377
in Mexico City and I said,
"I can clean walls,

3215
03:22:19,460 --> 03:22:22,380
I can sweep the floors."
I didn't get the job.

3216
03:22:22,463 --> 03:22:25,258
-Oh. -Later, he worked with me on <i>Mimic</i>.

3217
03:22:25,341 --> 03:22:26,342
- Oh, yeah, that's right. You did.

3218
03:22:26,425 --> 03:22:27,260
-For-- for a few weeks.
-Of course you worked with him.

3219
03:22:27,343 --> 03:22:28,177
-Yeah, yeah, yeah.
-Of course you did.

3220
03:22:28,261 --> 03:22:30,721
We spent hours just shooting the shit.

3221
03:22:35,935 --> 03:22:40,356
And I would be watching, you know
and we would actually be filming stuff.

3222
03:22:40,439 --> 03:22:44,652
Carpenter and Rob would be talking
or Rob would be trying

3223
03:22:44,735 --> 03:22:46,445
to explain what he wanted to see.

3224
03:22:46,529 --> 03:22:50,366
And John Carpenter would just,
"Go ahead, Rob."

3225
03:22:50,449 --> 03:22:54,328
Rob was a great storyteller
and is a great storyteller.

3226
03:22:55,413 --> 03:22:58,916
When he describes something,
you-- you get kind of swept up in it.

3227
03:22:59,000 --> 03:23:03,254
And I think John could see the vision,
the wildness of this.

3228
03:23:04,422 --> 03:23:06,924
- I'm sure that once the movie came out

3229
03:23:07,008 --> 03:23:11,846
and there was such a tremendous backlash
against how visceral

3230
03:23:11,929 --> 03:23:15,391
and gory a lot of people reacted that John

3231
03:23:15,474 --> 03:23:19,604
probably wished that
he had reined it in a little bit.

3232
03:23:19,687 --> 03:23:22,315
But John made the movie he wanted to make.

3233
03:23:22,398 --> 03:23:24,650
And you know,
with the help of Rob, you know,

3234
03:23:24,734 --> 03:23:28,237
that movie now stands the test
of time as a classic.

3235
03:23:28,321 --> 03:23:31,866
So it's like a childlike excitement
for something,

3236
03:23:31,949 --> 03:23:36,037
which keeps you pushing to want to--
to want to get to that,

3237
03:23:36,120 --> 03:23:37,580
to want to finish that.

3238
03:23:48,549 --> 03:23:51,928
We were a bunch of kids.
You know, I was 26.

3239
03:23:52,011 --> 03:23:55,097
I think I was the oldest guy there.

3240
03:23:55,181 --> 03:23:56,974
Rob was 22.

3241
03:23:57,058 --> 03:23:59,727
I mean, we were a bunch
of youngsters doing this stuff.

3242
03:23:59,810 --> 03:24:02,313
And we were just having fun,
blasting the music.

3243
03:24:02,396 --> 03:24:06,150
When Jimi Hendrix would come on,
I'd get acetone and put a line

3244
03:24:06,233 --> 03:24:08,444
of acetone around the radio
and turn the lights off

3245
03:24:08,527 --> 03:24:10,404
and light the acetone on fire.

3246
03:24:10,488 --> 03:24:12,490
"When Jimi's playing, you bow down."

3247
03:24:13,783 --> 03:24:18,955
If we heard over the intercom,
uh, "Erik Jensen,

3248
03:24:19,038 --> 03:24:24,835
you have a guest at the front",
that was a signal for myself

3249
03:24:24,919 --> 03:24:28,464
and about three other people
who were not union

3250
03:24:28,547 --> 03:24:30,549
to run like roaches.

3251
03:24:31,467 --> 03:24:35,262
In the back of Hartland,
Battlestar Galactica,

3252
03:24:35,346 --> 03:24:37,556
planets and spaceships were stored.

3253
03:24:37,640 --> 03:24:42,937
So we'd go all the way down the--
the back of this warehouse

3254
03:24:43,020 --> 03:24:49,318
and just sit in the dark on the floor
while the--

3255
03:24:49,402 --> 03:24:54,031
one of the union stewards came in
to visit and check out the shop.

3256
03:24:54,115 --> 03:24:56,158
John Carpenter
would come visit periodically,

3257
03:24:56,242 --> 03:24:58,452
particularly after principal photography
was over,

3258
03:24:58,536 --> 03:25:00,705
and he'd come over about once a week.

3259
03:25:00,788 --> 03:25:04,333
And we had a-- a pile
of movie magazines, Fangoria,

3260
03:25:04,417 --> 03:25:06,836
Cinefantastique, Starlog.

3261
03:25:06,919 --> 03:25:08,796
We had this desk with all this stuff.

3262
03:25:08,879 --> 03:25:14,051
I had found this magazine
that Adrienne Barbeau had--

3263
03:25:14,135 --> 03:25:18,347
had appeared in topless, a men's magazine.

3264
03:25:18,431 --> 03:25:20,641
I knew John was coming over

3265
03:25:20,725 --> 03:25:23,477
and I purposely kind of buried it
down a little bit.

3266
03:25:23,561 --> 03:25:27,732
I had the page open to Adrienne,
who he was married to at the time.

3267
03:25:27,815 --> 03:25:29,817
And we were all just kind of waiting,
'cause John would come over

3268
03:25:29,900 --> 03:25:32,069
and look at those magazines all the time.

3269
03:25:32,153 --> 03:25:35,990
And he looked at the new Fangoria
and then--

3270
03:25:36,073 --> 03:25:38,242
and then the third one down,
he picks up this magazine

3271
03:25:38,325 --> 03:25:40,870
with Adrienne topless, "Ay!"

3272
03:25:42,538 --> 03:25:43,664
We were cracking.

3273
03:25:46,375 --> 03:25:48,669
- Rob, he would just be fun
in the shop, too.

3274
03:25:48,753 --> 03:25:50,755
Somebody gave him a present.

3275
03:25:50,838 --> 03:25:54,759
It's a tube that goes on your finger
and you press flammable paper into it

3276
03:25:54,842 --> 03:25:58,137
and then you-- a flame shoots
out of your hand.

3277
03:25:58,220 --> 03:26:01,807
When-- when he got that for a present,
everyone was like watching their back,

3278
03:26:01,891 --> 03:26:04,560
'cause he would be shooting
that thing at everybody.

3279
03:26:14,695 --> 03:26:17,114
- The production value
is phenomenal in that film.

3280
03:26:17,198 --> 03:26:19,867
And Rob Bottin was given a great budget.

3281
03:26:19,950 --> 03:26:21,118
He had a huge crew on that.

3282
03:26:21,202 --> 03:26:23,329
I mean, for-- for those days,
that was a gigantic crew.

3283
03:26:23,412 --> 03:26:26,999
30 to 40 people working on that
for well over a year.

3284
03:26:28,250 --> 03:26:32,046
He, in a sense, was a genius in many ways.

3285
03:26:32,129 --> 03:26:35,549
But I think it was painful for him
to get everybody

3286
03:26:35,633 --> 03:26:38,886
to understand what he was thinking
all the time.

3287
03:26:38,969 --> 03:26:42,431
And uh, I think he--
he worked really hard,

3288
03:26:42,515 --> 03:26:47,770
but grew frustrated sometimes,
because he had so many ideas

3289
03:26:47,853 --> 03:26:49,563
and he couldn't do everything.

3290
03:26:49,647 --> 03:26:51,649
And I know that-- that--
that he did have some help.

3291
03:26:51,732 --> 03:26:54,777
There were some--
some production folks who came in

3292
03:26:54,860 --> 03:26:58,322
to bring structure to it,
'cause I think from what I heard

3293
03:26:58,405 --> 03:27:00,866
it might have been a kind of
a chaotic process

3294
03:27:00,950 --> 03:27:02,284
as you would expect.

3295
03:27:02,326 --> 03:27:03,953
There was so much in there, it was hard

3296
03:27:04,036 --> 03:27:06,038
to pull it all out and say,
"How are we gonna do it?"

3297
03:27:06,122 --> 03:27:07,456
"Well, I'm working on that."

3298
03:27:08,874 --> 03:27:12,378
My role was kind of be
the right hand guy who--

3299
03:27:12,461 --> 03:27:14,213
who plays hardball sometimes.

3300
03:27:15,297 --> 03:27:19,176
The most difficult part
of the process for us was,

3301
03:27:19,260 --> 03:27:21,554
"When are these effects gonna be ready?"

3302
03:27:21,637 --> 03:27:23,931
You know, 'cause we were always
behind the eight ball.

3303
03:27:24,014 --> 03:27:27,893
And by the way, at the end of the day
it's fucking fantastic.

3304
03:27:27,977 --> 03:27:30,062
You know, as-- as Larry Franco said,
"We couldn't

3305
03:27:30,146 --> 03:27:32,189
get Rob to go from point A to point B."

3306
03:27:32,273 --> 03:27:34,900
I mean, it was, you know,
what we were getting eventually

3307
03:27:34,984 --> 03:27:38,070
was you know, great,
but it was way, way slow in coming

3308
03:27:38,154 --> 03:27:42,783
and there was just no way to keep track
of uh-- of getting it done.

3309
03:27:42,867 --> 03:27:46,745
Like The Thing itself,
it was metastasizing.

3310
03:27:46,829 --> 03:27:49,206
It was morphing into other things.

3311
03:27:49,290 --> 03:27:53,460
And his, you know,
his-- his fertile imagination would be

3312
03:27:53,544 --> 03:27:58,257
adding aspects to this development,
the creature evolving.

3313
03:27:59,925 --> 03:28:03,179
I almost, like, had a little breakdown.

3314
03:28:03,262 --> 03:28:06,182
I did actually at one point
towards the end.

3315
03:28:06,265 --> 03:28:12,438
Um, they-- I was having a hard time um,

3316
03:28:12,521 --> 03:28:15,774
with being exhausted and I sta--
and it was starting to affect me.

3317
03:28:15,858 --> 03:28:19,028
And so Rob let me--
he had gotten a hotel room.

3318
03:28:19,111 --> 03:28:21,071
He let me go ahead and go over there.

3319
03:28:21,155 --> 03:28:24,992
And go to sleep, which almost was worse.

3320
03:28:25,075 --> 03:28:29,205
Because when I woke up,
because I think Erik called me,

3321
03:28:29,288 --> 03:28:33,083
and I woke up,
I was completely incoherent.

3322
03:28:33,167 --> 03:28:36,629
Rob always talks about the fact
that-- that he literally suffered

3323
03:28:36,712 --> 03:28:39,298
from exhaustion
and was hospitalized when--

3324
03:28:39,381 --> 03:28:42,301
when the-- the movie
was wrapped be-- just because

3325
03:28:42,384 --> 03:28:44,678
of the amount of stress and strain
that was put on him

3326
03:28:44,762 --> 03:28:47,556
that he put on himself, I'm quite sure.

3327
03:28:53,520 --> 03:28:55,231
- The dog head the peels open.

3328
03:28:55,314 --> 03:28:59,652
This was the la-- very last gag
that we shot on the film.

3329
03:28:59,735 --> 03:29:01,737
Production had been wrapped for months.

3330
03:29:01,820 --> 03:29:03,989
We had completed all the other gags

3331
03:29:04,073 --> 03:29:07,576
and this was the last little piece
that we needed to shoot.

3332
03:29:07,660 --> 03:29:11,830
We had a sneak preview in Las Vegas
the following week.

3333
03:29:11,914 --> 03:29:14,458
Fortunately, we got it in-- in one take.

3334
03:29:15,376 --> 03:29:18,629
The following week, we wrapped up Hartland

3335
03:29:18,712 --> 03:29:22,132
and we flew up to Las Vegas
and saw the sneak preview.

3336
03:29:22,216 --> 03:29:24,176
And the film came out four weeks later.

3337
03:29:25,261 --> 03:29:26,512
That's how tight it was.

3338
03:29:33,394 --> 03:29:38,899
- Today's world with the emphasis
on a digital pipeline

3339
03:29:38,983 --> 03:29:43,487
and pre-visualization
and all that, it kind of,

3340
03:29:43,570 --> 03:29:47,408
on the one hand,
makes sure things go smoothly,

3341
03:29:47,491 --> 03:29:51,704
but on the other hand,
it doesn't invite serendipity,

3342
03:29:51,787 --> 03:29:57,876
and happenstance, and spontaneity
in the creation and execution.

3343
03:29:57,960 --> 03:30:03,132
It kind of hammers out
all of the imperfections or risk,

3344
03:30:03,215 --> 03:30:07,845
and as a result, it doesn't feel
as alive, and wet,

3345
03:30:07,928 --> 03:30:10,139
and tactile on film.

3346
03:30:11,473 --> 03:30:15,436
We Gen Xers are always,
when we go in to make our movies,

3347
03:30:15,519 --> 03:30:18,897
we're always begging
to have practical effects,

3348
03:30:18,981 --> 03:30:21,734
because those are the movies
that we grew up with.

3349
03:30:21,817 --> 03:30:26,655
Uh, and then you do it and--
and you realize the complication

3350
03:30:26,739 --> 03:30:31,827
of-- of having so many moving parts to--
to work at the same time.

3351
03:30:31,910 --> 03:30:35,956
And when I say moving parts,
I don't think there is any movie

3352
03:30:36,040 --> 03:30:41,003
with a creature with so many moving parts
with so-- you know, in a single shot.

3353
03:30:41,086 --> 03:30:45,215
So it's insane what they achieved there.
Just insane.

3354
03:30:45,299 --> 03:30:49,553
We tend to be hyperbolic
and we overuse words like genius.

3355
03:30:49,636 --> 03:30:52,097
But what Bottin did was genius.

3356
03:30:52,181 --> 03:30:54,725
And you look at the man's career,

3357
03:30:54,808 --> 03:30:59,063
you look at the makeup in <i>Legend</i>,
the makeup on Tim Curry.

3358
03:30:59,146 --> 03:31:00,397
-the makeup on--
-[indistinct speech]

3359
03:31:00,481 --> 03:31:04,318
On Robert Picardo who played the--
the swamp witch.

3360
03:31:05,152 --> 03:31:08,447
I mean, in the biggest friggin'

3361
03:31:08,530 --> 03:31:12,284
Panavision close-ups you can imagine,
that makeup is flawless.

3362
03:31:12,368 --> 03:31:16,372
<i>Who be this tender morsel?</i>

3363
03:31:16,455 --> 03:31:19,375
Bottin was just like on another level.

3364
03:31:19,458 --> 03:31:22,252
You could put the Mount Rushmore
of great makeup artists.

3365
03:31:22,336 --> 03:31:23,629
Yeah, oh, he's there.

3366
03:31:23,712 --> 03:31:25,672
Yeah, I think he might have
his own mountain, actually.

3367
03:31:25,756 --> 03:31:26,340
-Yeah.
-You know?

3368
03:31:26,423 --> 03:31:28,300
I mean, there's obviously the Dick Smiths

3369
03:31:28,384 --> 03:31:30,886
-who was the godfather of--
-Rick Baker--

3370
03:31:30,969 --> 03:31:32,846
- So many including Rick. -John Chambers.

3371
03:31:32,930 --> 03:31:35,057
- All of those guys
are brilliant, brilliant.

3372
03:31:35,140 --> 03:31:38,018
-Jack Pierce. And Bottin, yeah.
-But-Jack Pierce.

3373
03:31:38,102 --> 03:31:40,854
But Bottin just like, what a homerun.

3374
03:31:43,774 --> 03:31:45,943
-He's profoundly American.
-Yeah, oh yeah.

3375
03:31:46,026 --> 03:31:48,946
You know, he has that--
that streak of pop culture.

3376
03:31:49,029 --> 03:31:50,823
And he's savage, like he's--

3377
03:31:50,906 --> 03:31:54,618
He's like, he's the Sex Pistols
or the Ramones,

3378
03:31:54,701 --> 03:31:57,037
-everybody else is a lot more tame.
-Yeah, yeah.

3379
03:31:59,748 --> 03:32:02,668
<i>He's alive! He's alive!</i>
<i>That dead trucker's alive!</i>

3380
03:32:04,962 --> 03:32:07,256
Same amount of time on the scene
as The Beatles

3381
03:32:07,339 --> 03:32:12,678
and the same kind of massive mark
that he made on the industry.

3382
03:32:17,641 --> 03:32:19,977
- Someone with Rob's kind of creativity,

3383
03:32:20,060 --> 03:32:23,897
he's just not allowed to work
like that anymore.

3384
03:32:23,981 --> 03:32:26,775
I think he just got disillusioned
with a lot of that.

3385
03:32:26,859 --> 03:32:30,529
<i>I'm not familiar with that address,</i>
<i>would you please repeat the destination?</i>

3386
03:32:32,823 --> 03:32:36,201
So he decided to back away.
He does his own thing.

3387
03:32:36,285 --> 03:32:42,040
And uh, but not, you know,
he just-- it's just not--

3388
03:32:44,376 --> 03:32:48,797
It just doesn't work in the system anymore
the way he used to like to work.

3389
03:32:50,257 --> 03:32:54,428
And I'll tell ya, for a good
uh, decade, uh,

3390
03:32:54,511 --> 03:32:58,724
you know, being in the business,
uh, we who are practitioners

3391
03:32:58,807 --> 03:33:03,187
of creature effects dreaded
Rob Bottin's return,

3392
03:33:03,270 --> 03:33:05,147
because he'd get all the work.

3393
03:33:22,247 --> 03:33:27,419
<i>You see, when a man bleeds,</i>
<i>it's just tissue.</i>

3394
03:33:41,934 --> 03:33:44,144
<i>-What do you got in mind, MacReady?</i>
<i>-A little test.</i>

3395
03:33:44,228 --> 03:33:47,272
But the reason to make <i>The Thing</i>
was the blood test scene.

3396
03:33:47,356 --> 03:33:51,485
<i>And Windows, you and Palmer,</i>
<i>tie everybody down real tight.</i>

3397
03:33:52,194 --> 03:33:54,780
- It's a scene taken almost verbatim
from the novella.

3398
03:33:54,863 --> 03:33:56,156
It's the one scene
that John said he wanted

3399
03:33:56,240 --> 03:33:58,617
to make the movie because of. He loved it.

3400
03:33:58,700 --> 03:34:00,619
And he told Bill Lancaster
at the time, he said,

3401
03:34:00,702 --> 03:34:03,664
"No matter whatever else you do,
no matter what you do,

3402
03:34:03,747 --> 03:34:05,916
keep this scene in."

3403
03:34:05,999 --> 03:34:08,794
His words were, "I know how to do this."

3404
03:34:08,877 --> 03:34:09,711
And he sure did.

3405
03:34:09,795 --> 03:34:11,380
<i>-What for? -For your health.</i>

3406
03:34:11,463 --> 03:34:14,132
<i>Come on, let's rush him.</i>
<i>He's not gonna blow us all up.</i>

3407
03:34:16,176 --> 03:34:18,053
- I figured out what I needed.

3408
03:34:18,136 --> 03:34:22,474
Uh, just a lot of shots.
A lot of cutaways.

3409
03:34:22,558 --> 03:34:27,563
And then this big monster explodes.

3410
03:34:27,646 --> 03:34:29,773
<i>He ain't tying me up.</i>

3411
03:34:29,856 --> 03:34:31,692
<i>Then I'll have to kill you, Childs.</i>

3412
03:34:32,568 --> 03:34:33,819
<i>Then kill me.</i>

3413
03:34:33,902 --> 03:34:38,490
Encapsulating all the horrors,
all the central conflicts

3414
03:34:38,574 --> 03:34:40,909
and themes of <i>The Thing</i>.

3415
03:34:40,993 --> 03:34:44,079
The paranoia, the mistrust
of your fellow man,

3416
03:34:44,162 --> 03:34:46,290
the power politics, all of it.

3417
03:34:46,373 --> 03:34:48,208
That scene is so effective.

3418
03:34:48,292 --> 03:34:49,626
<i>I mean it.</i>

3419
03:34:53,755 --> 03:34:54,881
<i>I guess you do.</i>

3420
03:34:54,965 --> 03:34:57,342
So there's no way to outsmart this Thing

3421
03:34:57,426 --> 03:34:59,928
until MacReady comes up with a blood test.

3422
03:35:00,012 --> 03:35:02,806
<i>The blood from one of you things</i>
<i>won't obey when it's attacked.</i>

3423
03:35:04,433 --> 03:35:06,351
<i>It'll try and survive.</i>

3424
03:35:06,435 --> 03:35:09,479
I am not a medical doctor, uh, obviously,

3425
03:35:09,563 --> 03:35:13,609
uh, but uh, doing a blood test
is not a bad idea,

3426
03:35:13,692 --> 03:35:16,820
at least the concept of it,
because that's one

3427
03:35:16,903 --> 03:35:19,823
of the first things you do when somebody
is infected by something.

3428
03:35:19,906 --> 03:35:22,034
Right? You're trying to figure out
is there something

3429
03:35:22,117 --> 03:35:24,494
in their bloodstream that's--
that's wrong.

3430
03:35:26,705 --> 03:35:31,752
If MacReady hasn't earned the position
for the audience,

3431
03:35:31,835 --> 03:35:35,756
that scene is not--
it can't be written that way.

3432
03:35:35,839 --> 03:35:38,967
It would be mayhem. It's like,
"You-- what you came up with this thing?"

3433
03:35:39,051 --> 03:35:41,219
Like, "Who-- why--
who are you to do that?"

3434
03:35:41,303 --> 03:35:42,804
And that was always worrisome to me.

3435
03:35:42,888 --> 03:35:45,974
Like you know, you gotta be that guy.
You gotta be that guy.

3436
03:35:46,058 --> 03:35:47,267
<i>Over there.</i>

3437
03:35:52,439 --> 03:35:57,277
I remember it having a kind of
reverence, if you will.

3438
03:35:57,361 --> 03:36:00,864
One felt like we were shooting
something important.

3439
03:36:03,700 --> 03:36:06,078
<i>- 'Cause we're gonna find out</i>
<i>who's The Thing.</i>

3440
03:36:06,787 --> 03:36:10,916
And using those great character
actors' faces, intense close-ups.

3441
03:36:10,999 --> 03:36:12,959
Like, "Is it this person?
Is it this person?"

3442
03:36:13,043 --> 03:36:15,420
It's an amazing example of editing.

3443
03:36:15,504 --> 03:36:17,047
With no music, by the way.

3444
03:36:17,130 --> 03:36:19,633
<i>Every little piece</i>
<i>is an individual animal…</i>

3445
03:36:20,717 --> 03:36:23,804
<i>with a built-in desire to protect</i>
<i>its own life.</i>

3446
03:36:23,887 --> 03:36:27,849
Now this is a situation
where MacReady is lording it over

3447
03:36:27,933 --> 03:36:31,937
all of us and claiming
he has all the power

3448
03:36:32,020 --> 03:36:34,064
and only he knows for sure.

3449
03:36:34,147 --> 03:36:35,732
<i>No, no, wait a minute. Wait a minute.</i>

3450
03:36:37,234 --> 03:36:39,486
<i>Let's-- let's do what Mac says.</i>

3451
03:36:39,569 --> 03:36:43,365
And I still don't think that
Clark was the kind of person

3452
03:36:43,448 --> 03:36:46,785
who weighed the consequences
of his actions.

3453
03:36:51,748 --> 03:36:54,000
I'm reacting against somebody
telling me what the fuck

3454
03:36:54,084 --> 03:36:55,877
I'm supposed to do.

3455
03:36:55,961 --> 03:36:57,921
They don't have a right to do that.

3456
03:36:58,004 --> 03:37:00,382
So for me, that was--
that was the orientation

3457
03:37:00,465 --> 03:37:03,885
and that's-- that's why
he makes that move.

3458
03:37:03,969 --> 03:37:06,680
John might disagree with that.
I don't know.

3459
03:37:06,763 --> 03:37:09,433
-Geez. This is bullshit, Mac.
<i>-Finish it, Palmer.</i>

3460
03:37:09,516 --> 03:37:10,934
<i>They're dead, Mac!</i>

3461
03:37:11,017 --> 03:37:12,519
That doesn't mean anything
to MacReady at that point.

3462
03:37:12,602 --> 03:37:16,565
We're-- we're well past murder
being a problem here, guys.

3463
03:37:16,648 --> 03:37:18,316
And that's basically the philosophy.

3464
03:37:18,400 --> 03:37:23,405
If I need to shoot you on the face
during a blood test, I will.

3465
03:37:26,283 --> 03:37:28,410
- That whole test he puts them through.

3466
03:37:28,493 --> 03:37:31,538
It's brutal, you know, it's--
but it's necessary

3467
03:37:31,621 --> 03:37:33,457
and it-- and it works.

3468
03:37:34,499 --> 03:37:37,169
<i>- We're gonna draw a little bit of</i>
<i>everybody's blood.</i>

3469
03:37:37,252 --> 03:37:39,212
And by the way, as we're-- I'm going,

3470
03:37:39,296 --> 03:37:41,047
"Why didn't they just prick the finger
to get a little blood?

3471
03:37:41,131 --> 03:37:42,382
Why they have to take the scalpel

3472
03:37:42,466 --> 03:37:44,634
and cut their freakin' thumbs open
so much like that?"

3473
03:37:44,718 --> 03:37:45,802
I'm like, "Come on."

3474
03:37:49,890 --> 03:37:55,645
<i>The Thing</i> and many other horror films use

3475
03:37:55,729 --> 03:38:00,942
a particular device
to increase the tension

3476
03:38:01,026 --> 03:38:04,196
and the anxiety in the audience.

3477
03:38:07,574 --> 03:38:12,788
We as an audience seeing
a needle penetrate the flesh

3478
03:38:12,871 --> 03:38:17,250
of a character in the movie
makes us shrink

3479
03:38:17,334 --> 03:38:19,544
a little bit, makes us recoil.

3480
03:38:20,670 --> 03:38:26,009
When we see Windows take a scalpel
and cut the flesh

3481
03:38:26,092 --> 03:38:31,056
of his thumb, so that
he can squeeze the blood out.

3482
03:38:31,139 --> 03:38:34,267
When I see something like that,
I-- I cringe.

3483
03:38:38,522 --> 03:38:42,275
The character who is revealed eventually

3484
03:38:42,359 --> 03:38:46,404
to be The Thing, embodying The Thing,

3485
03:38:46,488 --> 03:38:52,118
Um, I very carefully did not give him
an eye light, a little glint.

3486
03:38:52,202 --> 03:38:58,208
Um, his eyes appear dead
and um, everyone else um, had that

3487
03:38:58,291 --> 03:39:01,878
little glint of life, you know,
sort of embellished the suspense.

3488
03:39:02,838 --> 03:39:06,925
The lack of eye light was-- was
just really in the blood test scene.

3489
03:39:07,926 --> 03:39:09,970
That is such bullshit.

3490
03:39:11,596 --> 03:39:16,268
However, if he says so,
I-- I agree with him 100%.

3491
03:39:16,351 --> 03:39:17,978
Whatever he says.

3492
03:39:18,061 --> 03:39:24,568
Well, the blood test is--
is like a master class in misdirection.

3493
03:39:24,651 --> 03:39:29,906
That's also a lot of just, you know,
what was shot on the integral characters.

3494
03:39:29,990 --> 03:39:33,910
That's your palette of colors to play
with on the canvas, you know?

3495
03:39:37,372 --> 03:39:41,376
And the sound effects
of the hissing copper wire.

3496
03:39:42,627 --> 03:39:45,589
And the copper wire scratching
the bottom of the plastic.

3497
03:39:48,717 --> 03:39:51,011
The question I had was like,
you know, "Does MacReady know?"

3498
03:39:51,094 --> 03:39:54,639
"Well, now I'm gonna and I'm gonna
show you what I already know."

3499
03:39:54,723 --> 03:39:56,850
Now I'll show you what I already know.

3500
03:39:56,933 --> 03:39:59,311
I mean, as a watcher,
I would still say it could've--

3501
03:39:59,394 --> 03:40:01,229
it could have gone…

3502
03:40:01,313 --> 03:40:04,024
"I was wrong. "I thought I was", oh, shit.

3503
03:40:06,693 --> 03:40:09,195
But I don't think that's the way
MacReady was feeling.

3504
03:40:09,279 --> 03:40:11,448
I think he-- "I'm gonna show you
what I already know."

3505
03:40:11,531 --> 03:40:16,494
When they cut back to Kurt,
the close-up shot,

3506
03:40:16,578 --> 03:40:18,371
they used multiple angles.

3507
03:40:20,040 --> 03:40:22,500
But then they used the same angle

3508
03:40:22,584 --> 03:40:27,088
of the fake hand a few times,

3509
03:40:27,172 --> 03:40:30,342
because it was a fake hand
with a tube coming out the bottom.

3510
03:40:32,302 --> 03:40:35,180
It seems crazy,
but how many years it took me

3511
03:40:35,263 --> 03:40:39,434
to notice that Kurt Russell's left hand
is fake.

3512
03:40:41,478 --> 03:40:44,105
It's like the scene in <i>Misery</i>
with the sledgehammer, you know?

3513
03:40:44,189 --> 03:40:48,485
You're convincing the audience that
what they're seeing is normal and real.

3514
03:40:48,568 --> 03:40:50,820
<i>-It's for the best. - Annie, please!</i>

3515
03:40:50,904 --> 03:40:54,366
That moment when the blood leaps
out of the-- out of the dish

3516
03:40:54,449 --> 03:40:56,952
is another one of the great jump scares.

3517
03:40:57,035 --> 03:40:59,454
<i>- You were the only one</i>
<i>that could have got to that blood.</i>

3518
03:40:59,537 --> 03:41:00,914
<i>We'll do you last.</i>

3519
03:41:04,584 --> 03:41:05,794
It didn't just bubble.

3520
03:41:05,877 --> 03:41:09,798
It didn't squeal and run around
in a circle like, "Ouch". It--

3521
03:41:09,881 --> 03:41:12,926
That blood could have fucking killed you.
Pardon my language.

3522
03:41:17,138 --> 03:41:23,937
We used a-- a hollow fiberglass hand
with a petri dish edges

3523
03:41:24,020 --> 03:41:29,818
and in the center was a balloon
that Willie Whitten had sculpted

3524
03:41:29,901 --> 03:41:34,197
a little comic you know,
"Ah", like a little miniature

3525
03:41:34,280 --> 03:41:36,574
snarled creature with little tiny hands.

3526
03:41:40,203 --> 03:41:43,832
<i>- Get away from me!</i>
<i>MacReady, burn it, hey!</i>

3527
03:41:44,791 --> 03:41:48,294
So the next part was
where the blood drops hit--

3528
03:41:48,378 --> 03:41:50,755
hit the floor and start moving,
traveling around.

3529
03:41:50,839 --> 03:41:54,009
Now that was created by uh,
the mechanical effects guy,

3530
03:41:54,092 --> 03:41:58,138
he's created a gimbal using
a axle from a--

3531
03:41:58,221 --> 03:42:00,390
a front drive Oldsmobile.

3532
03:42:00,473 --> 03:42:02,934
And it was like a 4x4 table
that had the same type

3533
03:42:03,018 --> 03:42:04,728
of flooring that the set did.

3534
03:42:04,811 --> 03:42:10,066
Such a simple special effect,
but it adds to the unkillability

3535
03:42:10,150 --> 03:42:13,319
and the approachability of the problem.

3536
03:42:13,403 --> 03:42:16,448
Which is one of the--
one of the problems with the thing is.

3537
03:42:16,531 --> 03:42:18,992
And I don't mean the movie,
I mean the-- the creature

3538
03:42:19,075 --> 03:42:22,829
is that you can't approach the enormity
of the problem you have

3539
03:42:22,912 --> 03:42:26,416
if a single cell is the entire thing.

3540
03:42:26,499 --> 03:42:27,751
<i>Palmer now.</i>

3541
03:42:32,464 --> 03:42:35,425
He looks like he just got called
to the principal's office.

3542
03:42:37,510 --> 03:42:42,599
No one in the audience would suspect
that Palmer is The Thing.

3543
03:42:42,682 --> 03:42:47,062
He seems harmless likeable, a little silly

3544
03:42:47,145 --> 03:42:52,067
but he's not a candidate for possession
by the alien creature.

3545
03:42:52,150 --> 03:42:55,862
And when you see it,
I think it's-- it's a shock.

3546
03:42:55,945 --> 03:42:59,491
It's unwelcome, unpredictable.

3547
03:42:59,574 --> 03:43:02,786
If you were a serious actor,
you would have, you know,

3548
03:43:02,869 --> 03:43:07,248
you'd a huge inner life boiling
within you.

3549
03:43:07,332 --> 03:43:10,460
I didn't, you know.
It was the magic of movies.

3550
03:43:12,128 --> 03:43:15,757
When I started to manifest as The Thing,

3551
03:43:15,840 --> 03:43:20,804
I think there were grips on either end
of that sofa, shaking.

3552
03:43:22,305 --> 03:43:27,310
Here comes another outrageous
transformation.

3553
03:43:27,393 --> 03:43:30,438
You know, we-- we caught Bennings
before it went a little too far.

3554
03:43:30,522 --> 03:43:33,733
This one we're seeing what happens
when it goes beyond the Bennings phase.

3555
03:43:37,695 --> 03:43:39,864
We flushed a bunch of chemicals
into the foam

3556
03:43:39,948 --> 03:43:41,574
and it swelled up.

3557
03:43:41,658 --> 03:43:44,702
'Cause it like, the head's like--
like this, hanging down.

3558
03:43:44,786 --> 03:43:46,454
And so it was one of those things
where you're like,

3559
03:43:46,538 --> 03:43:47,914
"Oh, that-- that looked cool."

3560
03:43:51,126 --> 03:43:56,089
Rob had created this Palmer head
with a fiberglass under form.

3561
03:43:56,172 --> 03:44:01,636
And it had little um, tubes that were
when they're inside,

3562
03:44:01,719 --> 03:44:04,097
they pump solvent into you.

3563
03:44:04,180 --> 03:44:06,599
Benzene which is highly carcinogenic

3564
03:44:06,683 --> 03:44:08,101
we found out years later.

3565
03:44:08,184 --> 03:44:13,231
But the benzene would swell up
the foam rubber face

3566
03:44:13,273 --> 03:44:16,192
and then you had the bladders
with the eye-- eyes popping out.

3567
03:44:17,485 --> 03:44:21,114
They shot that in reverse
with a stunt guy flopping down.

3568
03:44:21,197 --> 03:44:22,615
And he drops back down.

3569
03:44:23,700 --> 03:44:25,535
<i>- Windows, Blast him!</i>

3570
03:44:25,618 --> 03:44:28,997
At one point, John was gonna use a gag
where you remember

3571
03:44:29,080 --> 03:44:32,375
Fred Astaire dancing on the walls
and the ceiling?

3572
03:44:32,458 --> 03:44:35,920
You have the set built
and then you fix the camera

3573
03:44:36,004 --> 03:44:40,466
and then he's always dancing here,
you know?

3574
03:44:42,051 --> 03:44:43,219
John wanted to do that.

3575
03:44:43,303 --> 03:44:46,264
Where he was gonna have Palmer
I think crawl up the wall

3576
03:44:46,347 --> 03:44:49,017
on his back and across the ceiling.

3577
03:44:49,100 --> 03:44:52,478
And I think the next day
it was announced that Spielberg

3578
03:44:52,562 --> 03:44:55,732
was doing the same gag in <i>Poltergeist</i>.

3579
03:44:56,733 --> 03:44:58,443
John scrapped that set.

3580
03:44:58,526 --> 03:45:01,529
Rob would come in with an idea.

3581
03:45:01,613 --> 03:45:04,490
I-- I particularly remember one time
him coming in

3582
03:45:04,574 --> 03:45:07,619
and saying,
"I've got this-- I've got this idea."

3583
03:45:07,702 --> 03:45:11,664
And it develops the ability to kill you
and kill it does

3584
03:45:11,748 --> 03:45:13,583
in spectacular fashion.

3585
03:45:16,419 --> 03:45:22,217
His head parts creating a giant mouth
and poor Windows is toast.

3586
03:45:26,846 --> 03:45:29,140
It was like,
"How-- how are we gonna do that?"

3587
03:45:29,224 --> 03:45:33,811
They made a puppet, articulated puppet
that would kick

3588
03:45:33,895 --> 03:45:36,189
and slam around and they rigged up the set

3589
03:45:36,272 --> 03:45:40,318
to break-- the lights to break
and set to come apart.

3590
03:45:40,401 --> 03:45:42,445
And that thing is-- that thing
was hysterical.

3591
03:45:47,075 --> 03:45:52,747
I had had a two-week break in shooting
before the death scene.

3592
03:45:52,830 --> 03:45:56,542
So I got to go back to New York
and see my friends.

3593
03:45:57,335 --> 03:46:00,588
I flew back in and the first thing up
for the day was you know, my death scene

3594
03:46:00,672 --> 03:46:02,257
and I knew it was gonna take all day.

3595
03:46:03,091 --> 03:46:04,467
It was a tough day's work.

3596
03:46:04,550 --> 03:46:06,761
I mean, I was bounced around quite a bit.

3597
03:46:06,844 --> 03:46:08,137
John was like,
"You know, are you all right?

3598
03:46:08,221 --> 03:46:09,764
We can get a stuntman to do this."

3599
03:46:09,847 --> 03:46:12,308
And I said,
"No, no, I want to do it. I can do it."

3600
03:46:16,187 --> 03:46:18,606
You know all good horror
has to have comedy.

3601
03:46:18,690 --> 03:46:20,608
If it doesn't have a moment
of comic relief,

3602
03:46:20,692 --> 03:46:22,360
it's just not gonna work.

3603
03:46:25,738 --> 03:46:28,616
It's almost like a Sam Raimi movie.

3604
03:46:28,700 --> 03:46:33,037
It goes so crazy.
And it's so almost silly.

3605
03:46:33,121 --> 03:46:35,623
There's something very undignified
about the way he's killed.

3606
03:46:38,376 --> 03:46:39,836
It's not a cool death.

3607
03:46:43,298 --> 03:46:45,341
<i>Dang it, God!</i>

3608
03:46:47,510 --> 03:46:50,013
Now that's the one thing that scared me
on this movie is--

3609
03:46:50,096 --> 03:46:54,642
is the fire, setting a human being on fire
and fil-- filming him.

3610
03:46:59,314 --> 03:47:04,319
Tony Cecere was the stuntman
and unfortunately, the first time

3611
03:47:04,402 --> 03:47:07,196
we tried to burn on him,
it wasn't big enough.

3612
03:47:08,072 --> 03:47:11,993
So I had to tell him,
"Hey Tony, we got to do that again.

3613
03:47:12,076 --> 03:47:14,495
It needs to be bigger."

3614
03:47:14,579 --> 03:47:18,374
And so he-- he-- he did it.
Engulfed himself.

3615
03:47:19,042 --> 03:47:22,003
Oh. Boy, I'm glad that's over with.

3616
03:47:29,802 --> 03:47:32,847
Well, I had a great stunt team,
but in this case, I don't think

3617
03:47:32,930 --> 03:47:38,603
anybody is anxious to set themselves
on fire, bigger.

3618
03:47:38,686 --> 03:47:42,690
So he was you know,
he didn't want to hear that.

3619
03:47:42,774 --> 03:47:45,026
<i>- Cut me the hell.</i>
<i>Come on get me out of here.</i>

3620
03:47:45,109 --> 03:47:48,112
<i>Come on get me out of here.</i>
<i>Cut me loose dammit.</i>

3621
03:47:49,447 --> 03:47:53,034
He allowed Donald Moffat to have
that wonderful moment

3622
03:47:53,117 --> 03:47:56,371
of complete, you know,
going from being Mr. Calm

3623
03:47:56,454 --> 03:47:59,123
to complete freaking out.

3624
03:48:02,043 --> 03:48:04,670
- And then all of a sudden
and I don't know,

3625
03:48:04,754 --> 03:48:06,631
John whispered something in his ear.

3626
03:48:06,714 --> 03:48:09,008
We're like, "Okay, what was that about?"

3627
03:48:09,092 --> 03:48:11,177
And the next thing you know,
he played it different.

3628
03:48:11,260 --> 03:48:13,513
He played it like you see it in the movie.

3629
03:48:13,596 --> 03:48:16,182
<i>- I know you gentlemen</i>
<i>have been through a lot.</i>

3630
03:48:17,517 --> 03:48:21,938
<i>But when you find the time,</i>
<i>I'd rather not spend the rest</i>

3631
03:48:22,021 --> 03:48:25,149
<i>of this winter tied to this fucking couch!</i>

3632
03:48:26,109 --> 03:48:28,736
Donald Moffat on the couch.
I-- you just like--

3633
03:48:28,820 --> 03:48:30,321
like you never get tired of watching that.

3634
03:48:30,405 --> 03:48:31,864
You know, it's just the best.

3635
03:48:31,948 --> 03:48:38,413
The way he changed you know pitch
and emotional reality

3636
03:48:38,496 --> 03:48:42,667
in a split second like that just had us
in stitches.

3637
03:48:45,503 --> 03:48:48,089
I mean, it was really like, "Okay."

3638
03:48:51,426 --> 03:48:52,635
It was a great moment.

3639
03:48:55,430 --> 03:48:59,058
- The sequence
where they're testing blood to me

3640
03:48:59,142 --> 03:49:01,978
is really right up there
with the deer hunter.

3641
03:49:02,061 --> 03:49:04,814
With De Niro and Christopher Walken
putting a gun to each other's heads.

3642
03:49:04,897 --> 03:49:05,982
<i>I love you, Nicky.</i>

3643
03:49:06,065 --> 03:49:11,821
I'd rate those two scenes as the two
most paranoia-inducing scenes in cinema.

3644
03:49:11,904 --> 03:49:16,534
It's maybe, maybe the best directing
Carpenter's ever done.

3645
03:49:16,617 --> 03:49:22,039
I have memories of John sitting alone
in the editing room

3646
03:49:22,123 --> 03:49:25,209
on a Saturday morning,
no one else around at the Moviola,

3647
03:49:25,293 --> 03:49:28,379
not quite willing to let go
of the scene yet

3648
03:49:28,463 --> 03:49:30,840
until he runs it through his fingers.

3649
03:49:30,923 --> 03:49:35,511
And he's running it slowly
frame editing taking his time,

3650
03:49:35,595 --> 03:49:38,848
taking the trim boxes off the shelf,
making the edits himself,

3651
03:49:38,931 --> 03:49:43,769
the splices themselves to the frame
until he gets it the way he wants it.

3652
03:50:00,203 --> 03:50:02,622
<i>Blair's been busy out here all by himself.</i>

3653
03:50:17,011 --> 03:50:20,389
<i>Childs, we're going out</i>
<i>to give Blair the test.</i>

3654
03:50:20,473 --> 03:50:24,268
<i>If he tries to make it back here,</i>
<i>and we're not with him, burn him.</i>

3655
03:50:26,479 --> 03:50:30,191
Blair's been busy. I think that
Blair had access to the outpost.

3656
03:50:30,274 --> 03:50:33,402
I think that Blair was in the shed,
but he built underground tunnels.

3657
03:50:33,486 --> 03:50:36,405
He could have been doing some things,
sabotaging blood,

3658
03:50:36,489 --> 03:50:38,533
Palmer, in a sneaky way.

3659
03:50:38,616 --> 03:50:42,787
<i>Hey Blair! You down there?</i>
<i>We got something for you!</i>

3660
03:50:42,870 --> 03:50:45,206
It's not just that The Thing
has Blair's memory.

3661
03:50:45,289 --> 03:50:48,668
Blair now knows how to build spaceships
out of helicopter parts.

3662
03:50:52,129 --> 03:50:55,299
Thinking about that scene
when he tells MacReady,

3663
03:50:55,383 --> 03:50:57,927
"Get me out of here, man.
Let me out of the shed.

3664
03:50:58,010 --> 03:51:01,556
I want to get out of here."
It's so well done.

3665
03:51:01,639 --> 03:51:03,599
And Wilford Brimley doesn't overplay it.

3666
03:51:03,683 --> 03:51:06,894
<i>I want to come back inside.</i>
<i>Don't you understand it?</i>

3667
03:51:06,978 --> 03:51:08,271
"Is he already been The Thing?

3668
03:51:08,354 --> 03:51:11,774
Even in that moment?
Was he The Thing?" Well, he was.

3669
03:51:11,857 --> 03:51:14,527
And he's building this scapecraft
under his shed.

3670
03:51:14,610 --> 03:51:17,989
<i>-What is it? -Something he's been making.</i>

3671
03:51:18,072 --> 03:51:19,657
<i>It's a ship of some kind.</i>

3672
03:51:20,866 --> 03:51:25,955
So once a Thing takes you over,
you now know how to build a spaceship?

3673
03:51:26,038 --> 03:51:28,499
Just because you majored in biology
did we find out that

3674
03:51:28,583 --> 03:51:32,628
he minored in magnetic transportation
or something like that? I, you know--

3675
03:51:32,712 --> 03:51:36,007
But the knowledge of all of those planets
that you've been to

3676
03:51:36,090 --> 03:51:39,135
once you become taken over,
you now have whatever

3677
03:51:39,218 --> 03:51:43,889
that organism experienced before,
you now have that in your DNA.

3678
03:51:43,973 --> 03:51:45,433
<i>Where was he trying to go?</i>

3679
03:51:46,809 --> 03:51:48,019
<i>Any place but here.</i>

3680
03:51:48,102 --> 03:51:49,520
Is it here to take over the Earth?

3681
03:51:49,604 --> 03:51:52,565
It doesn't seem so to me.
It seems like that was a mistake.

3682
03:51:52,648 --> 03:51:55,776
They crashed here
and now that they've revived,

3683
03:51:55,860 --> 03:51:57,820
thanks to the Norwegians taking
that block of ice out,

3684
03:51:57,903 --> 03:51:59,196
they want to get off this planet.

3685
03:51:59,280 --> 03:52:02,116
I mean, that's what it seems to me
based on that um,

3686
03:52:02,199 --> 03:52:05,244
little escape ship that--
that Blair is building.

3687
03:52:05,328 --> 03:52:07,455
But it's never answered.

3688
03:52:07,538 --> 03:52:09,290
<i>It got back inside and blew the generator.</i>

3689
03:52:12,710 --> 03:52:14,879
<i>In six hours it'll be 100 below in here.</i>

3690
03:52:14,962 --> 03:52:17,131
Well, it can get colder
than minus 100 Fahrenheit.

3691
03:52:17,214 --> 03:52:19,884
Talking Fahrenheit.
Which is about 73 I think C.

3692
03:52:19,967 --> 03:52:21,302
<i>Well, that's suicide!</i>

3693
03:52:22,928 --> 03:52:24,847
<i>Not for that Thing.</i>

3694
03:52:24,930 --> 03:52:26,474
<i>It wants to freeze now.</i>

3695
03:52:26,557 --> 03:52:30,728
What I found was on a minus 100 day
that wasn't the worst.

3696
03:52:30,811 --> 03:52:34,231
The worst would be like minus 80
to minus 90 with winds.

3697
03:52:34,315 --> 03:52:37,568
With the winds blowing hard.
And uh, boy I felt that.

3698
03:52:37,652 --> 03:52:40,279
<i>Whether we make it or not we can't let</i>
<i>that Thing freeze again.</i>

3699
03:52:42,782 --> 03:52:45,326
<i>Maybe we'll just warm things up</i>
<i>a little around here.</i>

3700
03:52:45,409 --> 03:52:47,578
Like this is the end of the movie.
We're gonna blow some stuff up.

3701
03:52:53,042 --> 03:52:57,004
But he still throws this creepy moment
in there with Blair

3702
03:52:57,088 --> 03:52:59,131
just digging his fingers
into Garry's face.

3703
03:53:02,843 --> 03:53:06,138
And killing off another character
in a way that makes you squirm.

3704
03:53:10,226 --> 03:53:13,104
Those are actually Rob Bottin's fingers
in there

3705
03:53:13,187 --> 03:53:15,898
with a prosthetic that was sculpted
with little

3706
03:53:15,981 --> 03:53:18,734
stretch marks for the fingers
that Rob put in there.

3707
03:53:20,653 --> 03:53:23,531
You're watching a man trying to resist it

3708
03:53:23,614 --> 03:53:27,743
and losing the battle to such
a nightmarish fantasy concept.

3709
03:53:30,079 --> 03:53:31,038
It's very…

3710
03:53:32,665 --> 03:53:34,083
it's purposeful.

3711
03:53:37,294 --> 03:53:43,259
Nauls, the cook, is possibly
the most stereotyped idea of--

3712
03:53:43,342 --> 03:53:45,845
of a black character at the time.

3713
03:53:48,139 --> 03:53:50,808
He's skating around the corridors.

3714
03:53:50,891 --> 03:53:54,270
He's playing loud music on his boombox.

3715
03:53:54,353 --> 03:53:57,690
<i>♪ Writings on the wall ♪</i>

3716
03:53:57,773 --> 03:54:00,526
- Usually the cook in the kitchen,
they are really important.

3717
03:54:00,609 --> 03:54:05,865
They have this godlike quality
in a team, you know?

3718
03:54:05,948 --> 03:54:08,951
You want to have the favor of the cook.

3719
03:54:10,453 --> 03:54:15,583
- I kind of like the idea of that perhaps
he's um, on the verge

3720
03:54:15,666 --> 03:54:19,754
of getting into trouble in um,
south central L.A.

3721
03:54:19,837 --> 03:54:22,798
and he's been sent out to the Antarctic
to keep him out

3722
03:54:22,882 --> 03:54:25,176
of the gang culture there.

3723
03:54:25,259 --> 03:54:29,138
T.K. Carter actually I think
transcends that stereotype.

3724
03:54:29,221 --> 03:54:31,098
He's-- he's very sympathetic.

3725
03:54:32,141 --> 03:54:34,769
<i>I think I saw Childs outside</i>
<i>the main entrance of the camp.</i>

3726
03:54:35,895 --> 03:54:38,147
So he always seems to pop up
at the right time

3727
03:54:38,230 --> 03:54:42,401
with the question that we want answered,
so that somebody can actually answer it.

3728
03:54:43,444 --> 03:54:44,737
"Why are the Norwegians doing this?

3729
03:54:44,820 --> 03:54:47,281
Why have they gone crazy?
Why have they come here?"

3730
03:54:47,364 --> 03:54:49,283
<i>Maybe we're at war with Norway.</i>

3731
03:54:49,366 --> 03:54:52,912
So the real cold in Alaska
had not settled in yet.

3732
03:54:55,122 --> 03:54:58,125
I was never uncomfortable.
T.K. Carter hated it.

3733
03:54:59,960 --> 03:55:03,672
"I'm from Beverly Hills. No, I don't know.
I don't do this." You know what I mean?

3734
03:55:03,756 --> 03:55:05,424
He just didn't…

3735
03:55:05,508 --> 03:55:07,510
Really good guy.

3736
03:55:07,593 --> 03:55:10,137
And really out of his element up there.

3737
03:55:13,015 --> 03:55:15,559
There's some Saturday nighters there
that are pretty

3738
03:55:15,643 --> 03:55:19,021
kind of like old Hollywood
could've got killed that night stuff.

3739
03:55:19,104 --> 03:55:20,231
You know what I mean?

3740
03:55:20,314 --> 03:55:24,235
T.K. was funny,
and very good, and creative,

3741
03:55:24,318 --> 03:55:27,112
and just, T.K. was just a good guy.
I had a great time with him.

3742
03:55:27,196 --> 03:55:29,448
-Where we going?
<i>-Up to my shack.</i>

3743
03:55:29,532 --> 03:55:30,908
<i>What the hell for?</i>

3744
03:55:30,991 --> 03:55:32,701
He could make me laugh. That's for sure.

3745
03:55:35,579 --> 03:55:37,873
Reading the novella was very interesting,
'cause it filled in

3746
03:55:37,957 --> 03:55:41,085
a lot of gaps or a lot of what people like

3747
03:55:41,168 --> 03:55:43,087
to call, "plot holes".

3748
03:55:43,170 --> 03:55:45,422
For example, you found out what happened

3749
03:55:45,506 --> 03:55:47,466
to Nauls, the cook.

3750
03:55:48,551 --> 03:55:50,678
Nauls', you know, death.

3751
03:55:50,761 --> 03:55:51,846
Couldn't-- couldn't afford to do it.

3752
03:55:51,929 --> 03:55:55,140
He shot one test with a box monster.
Didn't like it.

3753
03:55:55,224 --> 03:56:00,813
The box monster.
It was a uh, a head and intestines

3754
03:56:00,896 --> 03:56:02,773
that were on top of this crate.

3755
03:56:04,024 --> 03:56:05,568
Nauls was walking by,

3756
03:56:05,651 --> 03:56:12,241
we had a latex dental dam
and a flexible like vacuum tube

3757
03:56:12,324 --> 03:56:15,119
for a vacuum, for pulls inside of it.

3758
03:56:15,202 --> 03:56:19,707
We just kind of like lassoed him with it
and yanked him into the box.

3759
03:56:21,250 --> 03:56:23,460
Visually, it didn't look good,
but I-- the mechanical part

3760
03:56:23,544 --> 03:56:27,172
didn't really work that well.
It was kind of awkward.

3761
03:56:27,256 --> 03:56:28,549
It kind of-- you could tell that it was

3762
03:56:28,632 --> 03:56:31,969
a hose inside of a-- a-- a plastic,
a rubber bag.

3763
03:56:35,890 --> 03:56:38,517
- So Nauls just walks off, you know.

3764
03:56:38,601 --> 03:56:40,686
Alone in the distance
and you don't see anything.

3765
03:56:40,769 --> 03:56:43,272
All those ambiguities sort of
piled up on the doorstep

3766
03:56:43,355 --> 03:56:44,523
of the final scene, I think.

3767
03:56:44,607 --> 03:56:47,651
And it, you know,
it caused a problem for audiences.

3768
03:56:53,032 --> 03:56:56,619
I love this sort of desolate, and austere,

3769
03:56:56,702 --> 03:56:59,288
and remote style of the film.

3770
03:56:59,371 --> 03:57:02,458
It doesn't let you in very easily.

3771
03:57:02,541 --> 03:57:06,462
You're sort of a witness to it.
And-- and it makes you do some work.

3772
03:57:06,545 --> 03:57:09,256
And it leaves unanswered questions.

3773
03:57:09,340 --> 03:57:10,466
<i>I said, how's it…</i>

3774
03:57:14,053 --> 03:57:17,097
There's a lot of elements
in <i>The Thing</i> that add

3775
03:57:17,181 --> 03:57:21,644
to that feeling that you get
when you watch the movie.

3776
03:57:21,727 --> 03:57:25,940
There's a very, very specific air
about <i>The Thing</i>.

3777
03:57:27,149 --> 03:57:31,153
And you know,
it starts with Morricone's score.

3778
03:57:36,492 --> 03:57:37,660
To begin with, I made a confession.

3779
03:57:37,743 --> 03:57:43,415
I never wanted John Carpenter to
uh, compose the music for this movie.

3780
03:57:43,499 --> 03:57:46,627
Um, by himself, that is.

3781
03:57:46,710 --> 03:57:49,797
Um, I mean, I love John's music,
particularly his score

3782
03:57:49,880 --> 03:57:51,423
for <i>Assault on Precinct 13.</i>

3783
03:57:55,135 --> 03:57:59,431
John's original idea for music was to take

3784
03:57:59,515 --> 03:58:02,643
the original Dimitri Tiomkin score
from the original.

3785
03:58:10,234 --> 03:58:14,238
And redo it electronically
in the John Carpenter way…

3786
03:58:15,531 --> 03:58:19,076
which sounds like a more
interesting idea to me now.

3787
03:58:19,159 --> 03:58:22,413
The studio did not want me
to do the music.

3788
03:58:22,496 --> 03:58:25,708
It was never-- they just
didn't want it to happen.

3789
03:58:25,791 --> 03:58:28,711
'Cause I think they thought
I was just like an amateur or something.

3790
03:58:30,963 --> 03:58:35,050
Stuart Cohen suggested Morricone
because he was available

3791
03:58:35,134 --> 03:58:36,927
and-- and he was brilliant.

3792
03:58:37,011 --> 03:58:39,304
I ended up making the deal
in John's absence.

3793
03:58:39,388 --> 03:58:41,682
You know, I was the one speaking
to Morricone and--

3794
03:58:41,765 --> 03:58:46,020
and he accepted the terms
which was $40,000 as a fee

3795
03:58:46,103 --> 03:58:48,981
and that we would come to Rome
and that he would do the film.

3796
03:58:51,316 --> 03:58:53,569
- I didn't speak Italian.
He didn't speak English.

3797
03:58:54,862 --> 03:59:00,117
I went over to Rome to meet him
and he played several piano pieces

3798
03:59:00,200 --> 03:59:02,244
for the main title of the movie.

3799
03:59:04,663 --> 03:59:06,915
And I thought they--
I just didn't think they worked,

3800
03:59:06,999 --> 03:59:10,461
so I said can you do something
with fewer notes.

3801
03:59:10,544 --> 03:59:15,841
John played for him his scene
for <i>Escape from New York</i>

3802
03:59:15,924 --> 03:59:18,135
on the piano.

3803
03:59:18,218 --> 03:59:19,094
And he was listening.

3804
03:59:22,848 --> 03:59:24,266
- There was no communication.

3805
03:59:24,349 --> 03:59:26,560
More communication.
Between John and Ennio.

3806
03:59:27,728 --> 03:59:31,565
From that time, from the moment in Rome
to the time Ennio set foot…

3807
03:59:33,650 --> 03:59:37,821
on stage 10 at Universal in late March.

3808
03:59:37,905 --> 03:59:41,658
Scoring session begins
with a 60-piece orchestra.

3809
03:59:41,742 --> 03:59:44,411
John was bothered by some
of what he was hearing

3810
03:59:44,495 --> 03:59:46,205
on stage that day.

3811
03:59:46,288 --> 03:59:48,248
And he was needing music
to drive the film.

3812
03:59:48,332 --> 03:59:50,084
That's what he was worried
about, Morricone.

3813
03:59:50,167 --> 03:59:53,629
Scary music.
Music that would drive the action.

3814
03:59:53,712 --> 03:59:57,091
And he's not sure he got that.
We finished the session.

3815
03:59:58,926 --> 04:00:02,513
Um, John shakes hands with Morricone,
you know, says goodbye.

3816
04:00:03,680 --> 04:00:06,100
And heads out the studio door
without saying goodbye to me.

3817
04:00:06,183 --> 04:00:07,351
I know where he's going.

3818
04:00:07,434 --> 04:00:10,813
He's gonna work on pieces
that he thinks he needs

3819
04:00:10,896 --> 04:00:12,481
outside of what he's heard…

3820
04:00:13,816 --> 04:00:15,400
which is what happened.

3821
04:00:15,484 --> 04:00:20,531
The two scores uh, Morricone, John
and John's editions

3822
04:00:20,614 --> 04:00:22,616
completely separate from one another.

3823
04:00:22,699 --> 04:00:25,953
Um, composed separately.
Worked separately.

3824
04:00:26,036 --> 04:00:27,496
Without the knowledge of the other.

3825
04:00:31,667 --> 04:00:33,919
What a way to start the movie out.

3826
04:00:34,002 --> 04:00:36,004
Boom, boom, che, che, che.

3827
04:00:36,088 --> 04:00:39,299
And then the bass comes in. Mmm.

3828
04:00:39,383 --> 04:00:41,468
And then the helicopter appears.

3829
04:00:41,552 --> 04:00:44,388
And you're going,
"What the fuck is going on here?"

3830
04:00:48,851 --> 04:00:52,271
- It's a great score. It's very spare.

3831
04:00:52,354 --> 04:00:56,650
And it's very electronic in places.

3832
04:00:57,568 --> 04:01:02,531
I think it's abetted
by Morricone orchestrations.

3833
04:01:02,614 --> 04:01:07,327
But at its very base it's very much
a John Carpenter score.

3834
04:01:12,249 --> 04:01:16,837
Such a great example of music becoming

3835
04:01:16,920 --> 04:01:19,548
an indelible part of a film.

3836
04:01:23,594 --> 04:01:26,471
After Morricone saw the film in Rome
four months later

3837
04:01:26,555 --> 04:01:31,185
when the first cue he hears is John's
underneath the titles of the film.

3838
04:01:31,268 --> 04:01:32,311
Underneath his credit.

3839
04:01:32,394 --> 04:01:33,979
He said, "Universal's got him
in Rome already.

3840
04:01:34,062 --> 04:01:36,148
So why-- why didn't John
just do it himself?

3841
04:01:36,231 --> 04:01:38,066
Why did-- need me at all?"

3842
04:01:38,150 --> 04:01:39,526
Well, we needed you,
because we needed you.

3843
04:01:39,568 --> 04:01:44,031
And there's enough there,
you know, um, that makes the case.

3844
04:01:45,824 --> 04:01:49,745
- But if you listen to the soundtrack
it-- it is orchestral.

3845
04:01:49,828 --> 04:01:52,331
A huge number of pieces.

3846
04:01:52,414 --> 04:01:55,876
Only the beginning and ending
were of the synth.

3847
04:02:37,417 --> 04:02:41,046
You know I never imagined
that we ever got a glimpse

3848
04:02:41,129 --> 04:02:44,132
of what the creature actually looked like.

3849
04:02:44,216 --> 04:02:47,886
It never reveals itself in its final form.

3850
04:02:52,849 --> 04:02:58,563
It's a sentient creature that is just
simply using the proteins

3851
04:02:58,647 --> 04:03:01,483
and the DNA of whatever its host is

3852
04:03:01,566 --> 04:03:05,195
in order to replicate
and move itself forward.

3853
04:03:05,279 --> 04:03:08,115
It's not <i>The Predator</i>
take the mask off. Right, like…

3854
04:03:11,910 --> 04:03:15,998
It's possible that the idea of form
is something very human

3855
04:03:16,081 --> 04:03:18,625
and it's like something beyond
our comprehension.

3856
04:03:19,626 --> 04:03:25,674
In that, it doesn't have any physical form
that we can relate to.

3857
04:03:25,757 --> 04:03:28,468
So what you have to remember
is the 1982 film

3858
04:03:28,552 --> 04:03:30,887
is not <i>Who Goes There?</i>

3859
04:03:30,971 --> 04:03:32,306
So <i>Who Goes There?,</i>

3860
04:03:32,389 --> 04:03:35,434
the alien was given a very specific form.

3861
04:03:35,517 --> 04:03:37,227
It was locked in the ice.
It was given tentacles.

3862
04:03:37,311 --> 04:03:41,273
It had three glowing red eyes.

3863
04:03:41,356 --> 04:03:45,235
It was kind of a bit like a weird
gorilla type creature

3864
04:03:45,319 --> 04:03:46,403
that was running around.

3865
04:03:48,238 --> 04:03:51,783
You had no idea what the fuck
it was gonna look like.

3866
04:03:51,867 --> 04:03:55,912
And then when you see, you know,
the end with Blair and the jaws,

3867
04:03:55,996 --> 04:03:59,750
it's-- it's-- you never really understood
what the true form

3868
04:03:59,833 --> 04:04:02,461
of the alien is, because it has no form.

3869
04:04:02,544 --> 04:04:04,129
It's just taken over life.

3870
04:04:11,219 --> 04:04:13,347
- In Dale Kuipers' original sketch,
that was meant

3871
04:04:13,430 --> 04:04:15,390
to be the final form of The Thing.

3872
04:04:15,474 --> 04:04:18,018
I suppose if there is a final form

3873
04:04:18,101 --> 04:04:21,021
and we never talked about there
being a final form.

3874
04:04:21,104 --> 04:04:24,775
If there is one, it's the Blair monster
at the end of the film.

3875
04:04:26,485 --> 04:04:29,071
But not really.

3876
04:04:33,200 --> 04:04:34,701
If you're watching this film
for the first time,

3877
04:04:34,785 --> 04:04:39,039
you're kind of absolutely traumatized
by everything that's happened.

3878
04:04:39,122 --> 04:04:42,709
So when the Blair monster
turns into a sort of like

3879
04:04:42,793 --> 04:04:44,753
all-you-can-eat-type monster,
where it's got

3880
04:04:44,836 --> 04:04:47,756
all the things incorporated.
It's got the dogs.

3881
04:04:47,839 --> 04:04:49,966
It's got the men. It's got everything.

3882
04:04:50,050 --> 04:04:53,845
Plus, other stuff as well.
It's almost a relief.

3883
04:04:53,929 --> 04:04:58,100
You think, "Oh, it's not as icky
as Norris or-- or Palmer."

3884
04:04:59,601 --> 04:05:01,353
To be fair, you're not thinking
at this point.

3885
04:05:01,436 --> 04:05:03,814
You're just thinking, "Kill the fucker."

3886
04:05:09,152 --> 04:05:13,281
I never felt that there was anything
missing from that scene.

3887
04:05:13,365 --> 04:05:16,034
You know, I liked the stop motion aspect

3888
04:05:16,118 --> 04:05:19,913
of how big the tentacle was,
and the floor exploding,

3889
04:05:19,996 --> 04:05:23,375
and all the physical effects.
I thought were fantastic.

3890
04:05:27,671 --> 04:05:33,760
Rob asked Randy Cook to animate
the Blair monster coming up.

3891
04:05:36,596 --> 04:05:38,348
Randy Cook did a stop motion model

3892
04:05:38,432 --> 04:05:41,393
and that The Thing,
once it would rip open,

3893
04:05:41,476 --> 04:05:44,521
that that little dog creature
sort of leapt out

3894
04:05:44,604 --> 04:05:48,024
and sort of crawled towards uh, MacReady.

3895
04:05:53,155 --> 04:05:56,450
It's interesting, and it's cool,
and I know that they shot it.

3896
04:05:56,533 --> 04:05:59,661
I don't know why they didn't use it.

3897
04:05:59,744 --> 04:06:02,539
It didn't work, because it's animated.

3898
04:06:02,622 --> 04:06:04,458
It just did not work.

3899
04:06:05,917 --> 04:06:09,379
- I don't think that's his favorite form
of presentation.

3900
04:06:09,463 --> 04:06:13,592
But we felt like some of the shots needed
to be supplemented this way.

3901
04:06:13,675 --> 04:06:17,637
Maybe a pull back, a big master shot
that that would reveal

3902
04:06:17,721 --> 04:06:19,181
more of The Thing.

3903
04:06:21,099 --> 04:06:22,767
You hear 'em talk about,
"Oh, we tried to do this,

3904
04:06:22,851 --> 04:06:26,730
we couldn't get the Blair monster, we--"
"What? There was more? What?

3905
04:06:26,813 --> 04:06:28,064
You're like, "What are you talking about?"

3906
04:06:28,148 --> 04:06:30,358
They had all these other monsters
they wanted to do,

3907
04:06:30,442 --> 04:06:33,737
but they ran out of money
and they ran out of time. My God.

3908
04:06:35,906 --> 04:06:39,284
- But the problem is that
when we had to create the actual

3909
04:06:39,367 --> 04:06:44,789
life-size puppet, we had to change
the proportions

3910
04:06:44,873 --> 04:06:49,377
from the original design
and it was much larger stomach

3911
04:06:49,461 --> 04:06:52,130
than what Randy had spent months
and months creating

3912
04:06:52,214 --> 04:06:53,798
this stop motion animation.

3913
04:06:57,886 --> 04:07:01,932
All right, well, and at the end
a 20-foot version

3914
04:07:02,015 --> 04:07:05,352
of a creature appears
and then you kind of go like,

3915
04:07:05,435 --> 04:07:07,521
"Where does it get that much mass?"

3916
04:07:11,358 --> 04:07:13,860
It has all the other creatures on it,
right?

3917
04:07:13,944 --> 04:07:16,071
Like it's got the dog,
it's got various heads,

3918
04:07:16,154 --> 04:07:19,824
so theoretically, it's an amalgam
of all of their protein

3919
04:07:19,908 --> 04:07:23,161
and all of their body mass.

3920
04:07:23,245 --> 04:07:26,623
That to me is a little bit of
a tricky concept.

3921
04:07:26,706 --> 04:07:30,001
That was sort of a thing,
a trope, uh, uh, um,

3922
04:07:30,085 --> 04:07:34,172
well, a sub-trope, I suppose,
in that era where you would have

3923
04:07:34,256 --> 04:07:38,760
like when the creature,
the final monstrosity is revealed,

3924
04:07:38,843 --> 04:07:41,304
it's kind of an amalgam
of all the other scary things

3925
04:07:41,388 --> 04:07:43,473
you've seen, right?

3926
04:07:43,557 --> 04:07:47,352
There's like a dog coming out
of the middle

3927
04:07:47,435 --> 04:07:50,981
and I think Rob was inside all in plastic,

3928
04:07:51,064 --> 04:07:54,484
because it was all gonna be
a big slimy mess.

3929
04:07:58,947 --> 04:08:03,201
We had the-- the jaw that--
on the side, we had the like

3930
04:08:03,285 --> 04:08:06,288
facial expressions,
we had the articulated arms,

3931
04:08:06,371 --> 04:08:09,457
the body rips open and a dog comes out.

3932
04:08:10,625 --> 04:08:15,547
We had 62 puppeteers working on that.

3933
04:08:15,630 --> 04:08:17,465
We were bringing in anybody we could find.

3934
04:08:17,549 --> 04:08:20,302
I brought my brother in,
every-- friends of friends.

3935
04:08:20,385 --> 04:08:24,264
There were people on-- on pumps for fluids

3936
04:08:24,347 --> 04:08:30,270
and there was lever pullers
and literally people with hands

3937
04:08:30,353 --> 04:08:34,566
through appendages and it was very tight.

3938
04:08:34,649 --> 04:08:36,901
People got to know each other very well.

3939
04:08:38,445 --> 04:08:40,071
- You know, one of the things
that's fascinating

3940
04:08:40,155 --> 04:08:43,992
when it was the idea
that two Things separated

3941
04:08:44,075 --> 04:08:46,328
would maybe not be the same, right?

3942
04:08:46,411 --> 04:08:48,913
'Cause at a certain point,
they have absorbed

3943
04:08:48,997 --> 04:08:53,168
different enough things that
they develop their own characteristics.

3944
04:08:53,251 --> 04:08:55,128
This one can turn into things
that this one can't,

3945
04:08:55,211 --> 04:08:57,255
because they've absorbed different items,

3946
04:08:57,339 --> 04:09:01,760
because they're really only
the sum of what they've consumed.

3947
04:09:03,720 --> 04:09:07,098
I remember the VHS years
where I kind of couldn't tell

3948
04:09:07,182 --> 04:09:09,392
that half of it was supposed
to be Blair's face.

3949
04:09:10,977 --> 04:09:13,104
John had to go hat in hand to Universal

3950
04:09:13,188 --> 04:09:16,191
to get the extra $100,000
to finish the Blair Monster.

3951
04:09:17,025 --> 04:09:19,944
By that time production
had been wrapped for months.

3952
04:09:20,028 --> 04:09:22,906
We were just doing all this--
they were just waiting on us.

3953
04:09:23,990 --> 04:09:25,533
The studio was getting worried.

3954
04:09:26,826 --> 04:09:29,162
I think one of the things
that happened as a result

3955
04:09:29,245 --> 04:09:34,000
of <i>The Thing</i> was practical effects
became the star of a show

3956
04:09:34,084 --> 04:09:35,835
for so many movies.

3957
04:09:35,919 --> 04:09:38,672
Rick Baker gets credit for the,
you know, changing the face

3958
04:09:38,755 --> 04:09:40,298
of practical effects
with <i>American Werewolf</i>

3959
04:09:40,382 --> 04:09:41,841
and winning that first Oscar.

3960
04:09:41,925 --> 04:09:43,510
And <i>The Thing</i> not being eligible
because they said,

3961
04:09:43,593 --> 04:09:47,972
"No, it has to be an actor in makeup
for it to win Best Makeup."

3962
04:09:48,056 --> 04:09:51,851
It changed how filmmakers
deployed practical effects

3963
04:09:51,935 --> 04:09:53,561
for at least the next decade.

3964
04:10:05,865 --> 04:10:08,284
I've actually got a whole list of movies
that are clearly

3965
04:10:08,368 --> 04:10:10,578
either influenced by <i>The Thing</i>

3966
04:10:10,662 --> 04:10:13,206
or just complete rip-offs of <i>The Thing</i>.

3967
04:10:13,289 --> 04:10:15,083
And one of the things is <i>Predator.</i>

3968
04:10:15,166 --> 04:10:17,127
If you think how the movie starts,
you have the spaceship

3969
04:10:17,210 --> 04:10:19,629
coming in from deep space,
it doesn't crash,

3970
04:10:19,713 --> 04:10:22,173
but it kind of drops a pod
that crash lands.

3971
04:10:26,302 --> 04:10:28,680
- We have the same question
on the <i>Predator</i> movies.

3972
04:10:28,763 --> 04:10:32,434
Like, "Is the-- did the Predator
fly this ship?"

3973
04:10:32,517 --> 04:10:33,935
"Yeah, okay he flew the ship.

3974
04:10:34,018 --> 04:10:36,354
Or-- or some other Predators
flew the ship."

3975
04:10:36,438 --> 04:10:37,647
"Did they build the ship?

3976
04:10:37,731 --> 04:10:40,650
Did guys with loincloths build the ships?"

3977
04:10:43,111 --> 04:10:46,322
You have a team of unknown guys
going into the jungle,

3978
04:10:46,406 --> 04:10:50,285
an alien environment,
looking for another similar team.

3979
04:10:51,202 --> 04:10:54,205
And the Predator's always invisible
you never really see it,

3980
04:10:54,289 --> 04:10:56,541
it's trying to remain hidden.

3981
04:10:56,624 --> 04:11:00,462
So many tropes from the <i>Predator</i>
is ticked off by <i>The Thing</i>.

3982
04:11:03,006 --> 04:11:06,384
If Kurt Russell was the star of <i>They Live</i>

3983
04:11:06,468 --> 04:11:09,012
instead of Roddy Piper,
I think that movie probably

3984
04:11:09,095 --> 04:11:10,180
would have done better than it did.

3985
04:11:10,263 --> 04:11:14,768
<i>I have come here to chew bubble gum</i>
<i>and kick ass.</i>

3986
04:11:14,851 --> 04:11:17,520
Although again, eventually it finds
its audience.

3987
04:11:21,232 --> 04:11:24,986
He's pulling up a wa--
layers literally in <i>They Live</i>

3988
04:11:25,069 --> 04:11:28,907
and revealing the real world
as it is underneath the surface.

3989
04:11:28,990 --> 04:11:31,326
You know, I think <i>They Live</i>
is actually a great comp

3990
04:11:31,409 --> 04:11:34,162
for this-- the quintessential
John Carpenter movie

3991
04:11:34,245 --> 04:11:39,584
in that his thematics are about
finding the dark world

3992
04:11:39,667 --> 04:11:41,085
underneath our own.

3993
04:11:42,921 --> 04:11:47,091
There are films like <i>The Faculty</i>
which really rift on it.

3994
04:11:47,175 --> 04:11:50,303
<i>-Take a hit. -No way, man.</i>

3995
04:11:50,386 --> 04:11:53,932
<i>Oh, come on, man. If you're not an alien,</i>
<i>you've got nothing to worry about.</i>

3996
04:11:54,015 --> 04:11:57,060
Gave another version
of the blood test scene.

3997
04:11:58,645 --> 04:12:00,980
- There's nods to it in <i>The Faculty</i>.

3998
04:12:01,064 --> 04:12:04,651
I mean, everybody references
that scene, because it's just--

3999
04:12:04,734 --> 04:12:06,194
it's just too iconic.

4000
04:12:07,570 --> 04:12:10,573
You know when I made <i>Cabin Fever</i>,
I-- I told Carpenter that

4001
04:12:10,657 --> 04:12:13,243
<i>Cabin Fever</i> is probably more
of a remake of <i>The Thing</i>

4002
04:12:13,326 --> 04:12:15,453
than <i>The Thing</i> is a remake
of <i>The Thing</i>.

4003
04:12:15,537 --> 04:12:18,665
They put Jordan Ladd in the shed,
that's putting Blair in the shed.

4004
04:12:18,748 --> 04:12:22,126
I mean there's entire shots that
I took literally just stealing it.

4005
04:12:24,712 --> 04:12:27,882
I compare <i>The Mist</i>
to <i>The Thing</i> quite often.

4006
04:12:27,966 --> 04:12:30,301
Those movies are very, very similar.

4007
04:12:30,385 --> 04:12:35,014
I think they both have a very,
very bleak oppressive tone.

4008
04:12:35,098 --> 04:12:38,268
Both of those movies end in a way
that you walk out

4009
04:12:38,351 --> 04:12:41,020
of the theater going,
"Oh my", like there's no like,

4010
04:12:41,104 --> 04:12:43,690
"Hey, let's go get some ice cream
after the movie."

4011
04:12:43,773 --> 04:12:46,943
<i>-Oh! Oh! -Oh my God.</i>

4012
04:12:47,026 --> 04:12:48,820
Well, <i>The Mist</i> is your thing
in a way. Right?

4013
04:12:48,903 --> 04:12:51,155
-Yeah. Very much so, very much so.
-Very much so.

4014
04:12:56,202 --> 04:12:59,622
They're ordinary people
who become extraordinary

4015
04:12:59,706 --> 04:13:02,667
by the obstacles and the challenges
that-- that they face.

4016
04:13:02,750 --> 04:13:07,130
Uh, and that's what makes his-- his
movies so effective and so powerful.

4017
04:13:07,213 --> 04:13:09,632
And I'd say the same thing
about Stephen King's work.

4018
04:13:11,384 --> 04:13:15,138
When I read the first draft
of <i>The Mist,</i> I threw the script

4019
04:13:15,221 --> 04:13:17,682
across the room when I got to the ending.

4020
04:13:17,765 --> 04:13:20,143
And I was like, "Ugh,
how can you end a movie…"

4021
04:13:20,226 --> 04:13:24,397
You-- It's not the kind of movie
that you really relish

4022
04:13:24,480 --> 04:13:27,108
experiencing over and over again.

4023
04:13:30,069 --> 04:13:34,616
Until you start appreciating,
you know, the masterful filmmaking

4024
04:13:34,699 --> 04:13:36,826
of Frank and of course, John.

4025
04:13:40,788 --> 04:13:45,293
So I consider those two movies
kind of brother and sister.

4026
04:13:45,376 --> 04:13:47,462
Quentin Tarantino makes <i>The Hateful Eight</i>.

4027
04:13:52,800 --> 04:13:56,888
He uses the cues that Morricone
wrote for the thing.

4028
04:13:56,971 --> 04:13:59,933
And he makes the movie set in the snow
with people trapped in a cabin.

4029
04:14:00,016 --> 04:14:02,602
It's the closest replication of <i>The Thing</i>.

4030
04:14:02,685 --> 04:14:06,898
It's the Quentin Tarantino kind of
Mexican standoff version of it.

4031
04:14:06,981 --> 04:14:10,276
But it-- it's very much influenced
by <i>The Thing</i>.

4032
04:14:10,360 --> 04:14:15,406
<i>One of them fellas is not</i>
<i>what he says he is.</i>

4033
04:14:15,490 --> 04:14:19,160
Tarantino made everybody watch <i>The Thing</i>
before we did <i>Hateful Eight</i>.

4034
04:14:21,788 --> 04:14:24,040
Both he and Robert Rodriguez,
when we were doing <i>Death Proof</i>,

4035
04:14:24,123 --> 04:14:26,876
you know, they-- they talked on,
and on, and on about John.

4036
04:14:26,960 --> 04:14:29,754
And the movies that John and I
had done together.

4037
04:14:29,837 --> 04:14:32,799
But something about
<i>Hateful Eight</i> musically,

4038
04:14:32,882 --> 04:14:35,051
'cause Quentin's very musical, right?

4039
04:14:35,134 --> 04:14:39,013
That sound, that musical sound
was-- is in-- was in his head.

4040
04:14:39,097 --> 04:14:42,141
<i>-Music time's over!</i>
<i>-What? Uh, Whoa!</i>

4041
04:14:42,225 --> 04:14:47,814
Of other projects that are,
I-- I think, tipping their hat

4042
04:14:47,897 --> 04:14:53,069
to <i>The Thing </i>my version
is this <i>True Detective</i> recently

4043
04:14:53,152 --> 04:14:55,863
with J-- the uh, Jodie Foster.

4044
04:14:55,947 --> 04:15:00,076
It's a big chunk of frozen
human beings and it-

4045
04:15:00,994 --> 04:15:04,580
that looks like a Rob Bottin special
to me, you know?

4046
04:15:05,540 --> 04:15:10,086
In <i>Night Country,</i>
there is a shot of uh, episode one of--

4047
04:15:10,169 --> 04:15:12,463
of Jodie Foster talking about the case
and <i>The Thing</i>

4048
04:15:12,547 --> 04:15:14,799
is right behind her on a shelf.

4049
04:15:16,342 --> 04:15:19,762
It's a TV show, and--
and it's a murder mystery, and--

4050
04:15:19,846 --> 04:15:25,226
so it's a different animal,
but that said, the seed of it all,

4051
04:15:25,309 --> 04:15:28,062
the seed of my show is <i>The Thing</i>.

4052
04:15:28,938 --> 04:15:31,566
The moment that I made the decision
that I wanted

4053
04:15:31,649 --> 04:15:35,445
to create this version
of <i>True Detective</i> in the Arctic,

4054
04:15:35,528 --> 04:15:40,992
I couldn't stop the idea of uh,
an Arctic research station

4055
04:15:41,075 --> 04:15:44,996
with only men and something horrible
happens to them

4056
04:15:45,079 --> 04:15:49,125
and their twisted bodies
are found in the ice.

4057
04:15:49,208 --> 04:15:53,963
So there is no <i>Night Country</i>
without <i>The Thing</i> very simply put.

4058
04:16:01,637 --> 04:16:03,431
I don't think I can look at the ending
objectively anymore.

4059
04:16:03,514 --> 04:16:05,016
It's just-- that's-- that's the ending
of The Thing.

4060
04:16:05,099 --> 04:16:07,060
I-- I-- at this point,
it's-- you know, it's like

4061
04:16:07,143 --> 04:16:09,562
you're playing your favorite record,
you know?

4062
04:16:09,645 --> 04:16:11,606
You're not gonna be like,
"Oh, fuck that last song."

4063
04:16:11,689 --> 04:16:13,024
Like you're gonna play the whole record

4064
04:16:13,107 --> 04:16:15,818
and I think that again,
the Mike Ploog of it all

4065
04:16:15,902 --> 04:16:18,112
comes through in that final
Blair Monster a little bit.

4066
04:16:18,196 --> 04:16:19,363
It's a little cartoonish.

4067
04:16:20,948 --> 04:16:24,660
If the film had ended right there
with defeating the Blair monster,

4068
04:16:24,744 --> 04:16:27,997
I would not have been as happy, I think.

4069
04:16:30,291 --> 04:16:33,503
The prior scares were more grotesque,

4070
04:16:33,586 --> 04:16:35,129
'cause they were a bit more personal.

4071
04:16:37,757 --> 04:16:40,218
So now you're fighting
a real full-scale monster.

4072
04:16:40,301 --> 04:16:43,346
Harder to do than ever
in physical effects.

4073
04:16:43,429 --> 04:16:46,265
Um, but you know very,
very effectively done and--

4074
04:16:46,349 --> 04:16:50,645
and a very satisfying end to that creature
getting blown to smithereens.

4075
04:16:52,688 --> 04:16:55,066
When I throw the dynamite
at The Thing, John and I

4076
04:16:55,149 --> 04:16:57,443
were trying to, to think of something.

4077
04:16:57,527 --> 04:16:59,946
You know, 'cause you can't just turn
around and throw it.

4078
04:17:02,698 --> 04:17:05,785
And I said, "It's really monster shit
crazy now, right?"

4079
04:17:05,868 --> 04:17:08,788
He said, "Yeah." And I said, "Why
don't I just say, 'Yeah, fuck you, too.'

4080
04:17:08,871 --> 04:17:12,041
and throw this thing at him."
And he went, "Yeah.", you know?

4081
04:17:12,125 --> 04:17:14,293
<i>Yeah, fuck you, too!</i>

4082
04:17:47,368 --> 04:17:49,912
I was extremely uh, proud of <i>The Thing</i>.

4083
04:17:51,247 --> 04:17:54,834
But uh, the studio objected to the ending,

4084
04:17:54,917 --> 04:17:59,714
because it was uh, it was uncertain.

4085
04:17:59,797 --> 04:18:03,885
And they are right.
The audiences hate uncertainty.

4086
04:18:03,968 --> 04:18:09,640
But I didn't care, because uh,
the real ending of the movie

4087
04:18:09,724 --> 04:18:12,185
would be everybody's dead
or everybody's The Thing.

4088
04:18:12,268 --> 04:18:14,353
So I didn't want to do that.

4089
04:18:14,437 --> 04:18:16,230
So I can leave a big question mark.

4090
04:18:17,440 --> 04:18:20,860
John had thoughts about it.
There weren't reservations.

4091
04:18:20,943 --> 04:18:22,820
They weren't really--
he just had thoughts about it.

4092
04:18:22,904 --> 04:18:27,325
He was-- he was playing it out in his head
and we'd started talking about it.

4093
04:18:28,367 --> 04:18:29,744
<i>You the only one who made it?</i>

4094
04:18:31,412 --> 04:18:33,414
<i>- Not the only one.</i>

4095
04:18:33,497 --> 04:18:35,875
He always knows the question
that's being asked

4096
04:18:35,958 --> 04:18:38,169
of whatever he's shooting.

4097
04:18:38,252 --> 04:18:40,630
That this might be good for this moment.

4098
04:18:40,713 --> 04:18:42,757
And he has a partner in crime there.

4099
04:18:42,840 --> 04:18:47,220
I always opt for, "Well, let's go
with what we feel is right.

4100
04:18:47,970 --> 04:18:49,805
Maybe they won't even get it
for 20 years."

4101
04:18:51,140 --> 04:18:55,561
- The ending as we shot it was--
was pretty straightforward.

4102
04:18:55,645 --> 04:19:02,568
To allow the viewer the opportunity
to question, to hypothesize.

4103
04:19:02,652 --> 04:19:04,278
<i>Where were you Charles?</i>

4104
04:19:05,571 --> 04:19:08,324
It felt like a Leone ending
where you'd have two gunmen

4105
04:19:08,407 --> 04:19:09,242
just sitting there.

4106
04:19:09,325 --> 04:19:11,744
The first one that happened to blink
would get it.

4107
04:19:15,748 --> 04:19:18,251
It's like the chest stalemate.

4108
04:19:18,292 --> 04:19:19,543
It's the ending of a chapter.

4109
04:19:19,627 --> 04:19:22,463
It might not be the ending
of the entire story.

4110
04:19:27,260 --> 04:19:28,928
- Oh, I find it tremendously bleak.

4111
04:19:29,011 --> 04:19:31,055
I mean, these guys
are gonna freeze to death.

4112
04:19:31,138 --> 04:19:33,391
I mean, that's just--
but they've given everything

4113
04:19:33,474 --> 04:19:35,726
to try and defeat a threat to humanity.

4114
04:19:35,810 --> 04:19:38,437
That makes them tremendously noble,
you know?

4115
04:19:38,521 --> 04:19:42,608
And these are blue collar, lunch pail,
working class guys

4116
04:19:42,692 --> 04:19:44,610
who are in this really crappy job,

4117
04:19:44,694 --> 04:19:49,198
but they stand up to fight
for all of hu-- humanity.

4118
04:19:49,282 --> 04:19:51,492
-It's not one thing that ending.
-No.

4119
04:19:51,575 --> 04:19:55,538
You can't-- you cannot close it
with one word. It's so powerful.

4120
04:19:55,621 --> 04:19:57,915
<i>Fire's got the temperature up</i>
<i>all over the camp.</i>

4121
04:20:00,960 --> 04:20:02,461
<i>Won't last long, though.</i>

4122
04:20:02,545 --> 04:20:04,338
That's the choice of an assured filmmaker

4123
04:20:04,422 --> 04:20:07,133
who knows what kind of story
he wants to tell. I--

4124
04:20:07,216 --> 04:20:09,176
As I-- as I understand it that
some of these alternate endings

4125
04:20:09,260 --> 04:20:13,931
were kind of uh, entertained
to satisfy a studio note.

4126
04:20:26,444 --> 04:20:30,948
And the studio spent the last few weeks
before release trying

4127
04:20:31,032 --> 04:20:34,368
to get me to change the ending.

4128
04:20:34,452 --> 04:20:38,539
Didn't change a thing,
because it-- it's apocalypse time.

4129
04:20:40,374 --> 04:20:42,376
And when it comes to the ending
of the film,

4130
04:20:42,460 --> 04:20:44,378
which is nihilistic,
I mean you shouldn't forget

4131
04:20:44,462 --> 04:20:48,549
the problems we were having
were being felt a quarter mile

4132
04:20:48,632 --> 04:20:52,428
to our east at Warner Brothers
by Ridley Scott,

4133
04:20:52,511 --> 04:20:54,555
who was having ending problems
and tone problems

4134
04:20:54,638 --> 04:20:56,474
of his own with <i>Blade Runner</i>.

4135
04:20:56,557 --> 04:20:58,184
And for exactly the same reasons.

4136
04:20:58,267 --> 04:21:01,562
I know how Ridley, you know--
you know, fixed his problem,

4137
04:21:01,645 --> 04:21:02,730
although I hated it.

4138
04:21:03,773 --> 04:21:06,108
<i>- I didn't know how long</i>
<i>we'd have together.</i>

4139
04:21:07,818 --> 04:21:08,819
<i>Who does?</i>

4140
04:21:08,903 --> 04:21:12,198
John actually saw a shot as a safety.

4141
04:21:13,324 --> 04:21:18,037
A shot of Kurt getting a blood test

4142
04:21:18,120 --> 04:21:20,122
and finding out he wasn't The Thing.

4143
04:21:21,332 --> 04:21:23,709
It was his protection against the studio.

4144
04:21:24,960 --> 04:21:27,463
- At the end of the day,
Kurt Russell's last shot on this movie.

4145
04:21:27,505 --> 04:21:31,258
And it was just a long, low,
dolly shot down one

4146
04:21:31,342 --> 04:21:33,219
of Universal Hartland's corridors.

4147
04:21:34,345 --> 04:21:36,180
In which the camera
slowly pivots and stops

4148
04:21:36,263 --> 04:21:38,891
and reveals MacReady at the end
of the room,

4149
04:21:38,974 --> 04:21:42,311
meant to be a hospital, dressed
pretty much the way he was

4150
04:21:42,395 --> 04:21:46,399
in the last scene, with Serape
over his shoulder and still ice-born.

4151
04:21:46,482 --> 04:21:47,400
Nothing else said.

4152
04:21:47,483 --> 04:21:50,778
No Childs, nobody else,
no extras in the scene.

4153
04:21:50,861 --> 04:21:52,780
Just this one shot.

4154
04:21:52,863 --> 04:21:59,161
Underneath it, orally you would hear,
a helicopter approaching. Excited voices.

4155
04:21:59,245 --> 04:22:01,163
Oh, we never cut it in.

4156
04:22:01,247 --> 04:22:04,875
Um, I didn't like it. John hated it.

4157
04:22:04,959 --> 04:22:09,713
And um, the most important thing
about this shot uh,

4158
04:22:09,797 --> 04:22:11,799
and this new ending is
that we did not tell

4159
04:22:11,882 --> 04:22:14,260
the studio that we had shot it.

4160
04:22:14,343 --> 04:22:20,975
I-- I-- I thought the idea of--
of suddenly having uh, Kurt,

4161
04:22:21,058 --> 04:22:24,019
you know, be the hero
and survive was just,

4162
04:22:24,103 --> 04:22:26,772
"No, come on. That's not this story.

4163
04:22:26,856 --> 04:22:29,442
You haven't been watching
close enough, you know?"

4164
04:22:31,861 --> 04:22:36,031
And we won that argument
and we lost that battle.

4165
04:22:36,115 --> 04:22:38,200
Because they didn't support the film.

4166
04:22:45,541 --> 04:22:49,086
If you meet a horror fan,
to this day, they go,

4167
04:22:49,170 --> 04:22:50,045
"Who do you think was <i>The Thing</i>?"

4168
04:22:50,129 --> 04:22:51,755
"Oh, you like horror movies?
Yeah, what's your favorite?"

4169
04:22:51,839 --> 04:22:54,508
"Okay, <i>The Thing</i>. Okay, well,
who do you think was <i>The Thing</i>?

4170
04:22:54,592 --> 04:22:57,720
Was he uh, you know, was it Childs?
Was it MacReady?"

4171
04:22:59,221 --> 04:23:01,807
-Oh, fuck you, man.
-That's what John would say.

4172
04:23:01,891 --> 04:23:04,185
Yeah, no. You're not gonna do that.

4173
04:23:04,268 --> 04:23:07,897
Not before lunch.
Take me to dinner and we'll talk.

4174
04:23:08,981 --> 04:23:10,024
No, I'm not doing that.

4175
04:23:10,107 --> 04:23:13,360
Me, I think they're the two
human survivors.

4176
04:23:13,444 --> 04:23:16,363
And they've sacrificed everything
to try and defeat this.

4177
04:23:18,741 --> 04:23:20,367
- So many theories have come out.

4178
04:23:20,451 --> 04:23:24,038
Is it that MacReady hands
across the bottle of alcohol to drink,

4179
04:23:24,121 --> 04:23:26,999
never drinking it himself,
and we know he's been throwing

4180
04:23:27,082 --> 04:23:31,170
Molotov cocktails everywhere,
so it's very likely that might be fuel.

4181
04:23:31,253 --> 04:23:33,547
Is it MacReady? Is it Childs?

4182
04:23:33,631 --> 04:23:36,258
Or is The Thing lurking somewhere

4183
04:23:36,342 --> 04:23:39,720
in the remnants of the, uh,
you know, compound?

4184
04:23:41,472 --> 04:23:44,808
Don't you think that the ending
is the perfect example

4185
04:23:44,892 --> 04:23:48,604
of it being a-- a Rorschach test
of who you are?

4186
04:23:48,687 --> 04:23:50,022
-Oh, yeah.
-I mean, that's--

4187
04:23:50,105 --> 04:23:52,691
that's a great thing when uh,
when people say about uh,

4188
04:23:52,775 --> 04:23:55,361
<i>Pan's Labyrinth</i>,
it was all in her imagination.

4189
04:23:55,444 --> 04:23:57,279
-It was not-- it was all real. -Hm.

4190
04:23:57,363 --> 04:24:01,283
That tells you as much about you
as it tells you about me.

4191
04:24:04,578 --> 04:24:06,580
Let's face it, they're both gonna die.

4192
04:24:07,373 --> 04:24:08,624
<i>- How will we make it?</i>

4193
04:24:11,377 --> 04:24:12,836
<i>Maybe we should.</i>

4194
04:24:14,630 --> 04:24:17,383
What do we learn here?

4195
04:24:17,466 --> 04:24:21,720
We see all this mayhem,
and all of this horror,

4196
04:24:21,804 --> 04:24:25,849
and a station blown to smithereens,

4197
04:24:25,933 --> 04:24:30,854
and these two guys sitting among
the fires that are dying out,

4198
04:24:30,938 --> 04:24:33,274
passing a bottle back and forth.

4199
04:24:34,817 --> 04:24:38,696
I wanted to believe that
they had made noble sacrifices

4200
04:24:38,779 --> 04:24:43,200
and every time you would discover
eh, eh, eh,

4201
04:24:43,284 --> 04:24:46,745
think about going down an alley
where Childs was The Thing,

4202
04:24:46,829 --> 04:24:49,665
you'd go, "Oh, I really liked Childs.
I don't want that to happen."

4203
04:24:49,707 --> 04:24:51,250
<i>It's a crock of shit.</i>

4204
04:24:51,333 --> 04:24:53,127
You know, of course,
over the years I've heard all

4205
04:24:53,210 --> 04:24:56,005
these theories about
why everybody thinks it's me.

4206
04:24:56,088 --> 04:24:59,091
I don't think it was me,
and I-- I don't remember.

4207
04:24:59,174 --> 04:25:02,970
I think we filmed it both ways,
as if it was one of us

4208
04:25:03,053 --> 04:25:06,015
and then if we didn't know.

4209
04:25:06,098 --> 04:25:10,227
You know, and-- and frankly,
I don't know the take

4210
04:25:10,311 --> 04:25:13,230
that's in the movie,
which of those takes it is.

4211
04:25:14,273 --> 04:25:17,067
You know, if anyone knows,
John only knows.

4212
04:25:19,528 --> 04:25:22,906
- Kurt Russell told me that
they didn't know how to get out.

4213
04:25:22,990 --> 04:25:25,409
They had one ending
and then another ending,

4214
04:25:25,492 --> 04:25:26,827
and he goes on nearly a daily basis,

4215
04:25:26,910 --> 04:25:29,038
they'd come in with like,
"Okay, this is how it's gonna end."

4216
04:25:29,121 --> 04:25:31,373
But I think Kurt said that the ending
of the movie as is

4217
04:25:31,457 --> 04:25:34,460
was Kurt Russell's suggestion
of how it ends.

4218
04:25:34,543 --> 04:25:36,920
When you sit down and say,
as a final line,

4219
04:25:37,004 --> 04:25:38,631
"Why don't we just sit here
and see what happens?"

4220
04:25:38,714 --> 04:25:40,299
You know what you're saying.

4221
04:25:40,382 --> 04:25:42,092
You know, I-- I think I wrote that line.

4222
04:25:42,176 --> 04:25:44,637
It was like-- it was like,
we were just tossing different

4223
04:25:44,720 --> 04:25:46,805
ideas around for weeks,
you know, and then we came down

4224
04:25:46,889 --> 04:25:49,558
to that line-- the whole thing
kind of evolved.

4225
04:25:49,642 --> 04:25:52,019
It works. It-- it really works.

4226
04:25:54,021 --> 04:25:58,233
It's not like Childs ran out
into the storm looking for Blair

4227
04:25:58,317 --> 04:26:00,444
and then got Thinged
and then like snuck back in

4228
04:26:00,527 --> 04:26:02,696
and then like put--
put on fresh clothes and--

4229
04:26:02,780 --> 04:26:04,907
and you know, came out again just--
just so we could

4230
04:26:04,990 --> 04:26:05,908
-fool Kurt Russell with.
-Oh yeah. If you--

4231
04:26:05,991 --> 04:26:07,910
-It doesn't make sense to me.
-If you-- if you <i>Columbo</i> it.

4232
04:26:07,993 --> 04:26:09,244
Yeah.

4233
04:26:09,328 --> 04:26:12,164
I like to think MacReady's human.
I love MacReady so much.

4234
04:26:12,247 --> 04:26:14,333
I didn't want to think
that The Thing got him.

4235
04:26:14,416 --> 04:26:16,794
I think that Childs might be a Thing
and he's just waiting to see.

4236
04:26:16,877 --> 04:26:18,879
But then why doesn't Childs show himself?

4237
04:26:18,962 --> 04:26:21,632
For the longest time I was sure
that it could, you know,

4238
04:26:21,715 --> 04:26:26,053
as a child, that it couldn't be MacReady,
because he's the guy.

4239
04:26:26,136 --> 04:26:28,180
He's our guy, right? He's Kurt Russell.

4240
04:26:28,263 --> 04:26:32,017
And then you grow up
and you realize, yeah,

4241
04:26:32,101 --> 04:26:35,229
you missed him for a bunch
of the movie. He was not there.

4242
04:26:35,312 --> 04:26:38,148
And he has been so proactive
to destroying The Thing

4243
04:26:38,232 --> 04:26:40,275
which could be the ultimate strategy.

4244
04:26:41,610 --> 04:26:43,237
There's an interesting
possibility there that

4245
04:26:43,320 --> 04:26:46,740
I don't really-- that I--
that I don't reveal.

4246
04:26:46,824 --> 04:26:48,033
That I don't talk about.

4247
04:26:48,117 --> 04:26:50,077
That I think the audience
has not considered.

4248
04:26:51,412 --> 04:26:55,457
<i>Thought I saw Blair. I went out after him.</i>

4249
04:26:55,541 --> 04:26:57,418
<i>And got lost in the storm.</i>

4250
04:26:57,501 --> 04:26:59,378
- So people write to me all the time.

4251
04:26:59,461 --> 04:27:02,464
They know everything about
every frame of the film.

4252
04:27:02,548 --> 04:27:05,426
And they go, "Because this happened
and that happened and this happened,

4253
04:27:05,509 --> 04:27:08,262
that must mean it's either this
or this, right?"

4254
04:27:08,345 --> 04:27:11,807
And I go, "I have no idea."

4255
04:27:11,890 --> 04:27:15,811
It's-- it's difficult to-- to-- to pick
which lane you want to go in.

4256
04:27:15,894 --> 04:27:18,397
In the Dark Horse comics,
Childs was The Thing.

4257
04:27:18,480 --> 04:27:19,773
It wasn't very satisfying to me.

4258
04:27:19,857 --> 04:27:23,152
What was satisfying to me was the idea

4259
04:27:23,235 --> 04:27:26,947
that these two guys died
to save the world.

4260
04:27:28,615 --> 04:27:32,453
- Unless our present existence
is going to be threatened,

4261
04:27:32,536 --> 04:27:34,538
The Thing wouldn't show itself.

4262
04:27:34,621 --> 04:27:37,458
When everybody says, "Oh, well,
the you know, no smoke comes out

4263
04:27:37,541 --> 04:27:38,625
of Childs' mouth."

4264
04:27:38,709 --> 04:27:43,338
It's like, that-- that to me
is the dumbest reason of all.

4265
04:27:43,422 --> 04:27:47,593
Because if you've ever sat
in front of a campfire

4266
04:27:47,676 --> 04:27:52,264
in the cold, if the wind
is blowing away from me,

4267
04:27:52,347 --> 04:27:53,390
then you see…

4268
04:27:54,516 --> 04:27:57,186
Then you'll s-- then you'll see
the condensation of-- of it.

4269
04:27:57,269 --> 04:27:58,687
But if you're sitting in front
of the fire,

4270
04:27:58,771 --> 04:28:02,983
heat is coming in my direction,
you're not gonna see anything.

4271
04:28:03,066 --> 04:28:04,777
That's just science.

4272
04:28:04,860 --> 04:28:07,696
<i>I just cannot believe</i>
<i>any of this voodoo bullshit.</i>

4273
04:28:07,780 --> 04:28:12,242
My standard answer is,
"It's so if you think so.

4274
04:28:12,326 --> 04:28:13,660
But it wasn't me."

4275
04:28:18,207 --> 04:28:21,168
- We were approached
by this sci-fi channel

4276
04:28:21,251 --> 04:28:24,254
to write this miniseries sequel.

4277
04:28:24,338 --> 04:28:27,466
And uh, 19 years later, I hope--

4278
04:28:27,549 --> 04:28:30,761
I'm still hoping to maybe
get to do that someday.

4279
04:28:30,844 --> 04:28:34,640
But you know, the-- the--
the cogs of Hollywood,

4280
04:28:34,723 --> 04:28:36,809
you sometimes, they get caught.

4281
04:28:36,892 --> 04:28:39,520
But what we were all really fascinated by

4282
04:28:39,603 --> 04:28:43,649
and excited about the potential
of with television,

4283
04:28:43,732 --> 04:28:49,988
was the possibility of depicting
Blair's prediction.

4284
04:28:59,206 --> 04:29:02,960
<i>U.S. Number 31 calling McMurdo. Come in…</i>

4285
04:29:03,043 --> 04:29:07,548
We started our story
with the idea that maybe

4286
04:29:07,631 --> 04:29:10,676
there was this Russian outpost,
not so far away,

4287
04:29:10,759 --> 04:29:13,637
that picked up what Windows
was broadcasting.

4288
04:29:13,720 --> 04:29:18,225
They come to Outpost 31
and they find the little shelter

4289
04:29:18,308 --> 04:29:20,394
where MacReady and Childs were.

4290
04:29:20,477 --> 04:29:23,397
And they basically just find them there,
like pointing guns at each other.

4291
04:29:23,480 --> 04:29:26,400
And MacReady's got the bottle in his hand
and they're just frozen to death.

4292
04:29:26,483 --> 04:29:30,237
And so they died paranoid, and frozen,

4293
04:29:30,320 --> 04:29:31,989
and pointing guns at each other.

4294
04:29:32,072 --> 04:29:34,825
But they were both human
and they were both heroes.

4295
04:29:34,908 --> 04:29:37,369
It's kind of like bringing alien
to Earth, you know?

4296
04:29:37,452 --> 04:29:40,998
It's like we wanted to bring that strain,

4297
04:29:41,081 --> 04:29:46,837
that organism, mutating organism,
to the United States.

4298
04:29:46,920 --> 04:29:51,133
And not to a big city,
but to an isolated little town.

4299
04:29:51,216 --> 04:29:54,678
It was about uh, a small town
in the desert

4300
04:29:54,761 --> 04:29:57,598
that has been infected
and has been quarantined.

4301
04:29:57,681 --> 04:30:00,434
So you're very much trapped
in this town with these people.

4302
04:30:00,517 --> 04:30:03,395
And it was more about
not so much solving the mysteries

4303
04:30:03,478 --> 04:30:06,273
of the original film, 'cause
we wanted to move on from that.

4304
04:30:06,356 --> 04:30:10,110
It was more figuring out things like,
if you're infected,

4305
04:30:10,193 --> 04:30:14,031
do you realize you're infected?
What's it like to be infected?

4306
04:30:14,114 --> 04:30:15,407
- It was a really good script.

4307
04:30:15,490 --> 04:30:18,243
David wrote a really, really
terrific script.

4308
04:30:18,327 --> 04:30:22,414
And it was very much in the--
in the world,

4309
04:30:22,497 --> 04:30:24,791
in the wheelhouse of John Carpenter.

4310
04:30:24,875 --> 04:30:26,877
We had that vibe.

4311
04:30:28,378 --> 04:30:33,258
One of the ideas that Frank had
that it was a lot of fun to write

4312
04:30:33,342 --> 04:30:35,552
was at the end of the film,

4313
04:30:35,636 --> 04:30:38,889
we wanted to have a swarm
of the spider heads.

4314
04:30:39,932 --> 04:30:42,643
It's like what Cameron,
who's another genius,

4315
04:30:42,726 --> 04:30:46,480
and I use that word advisedly, you
know, it's what he did with-- with <i>Aliens</i>.

4316
04:30:46,563 --> 04:30:51,485
He took something that was brilliant
and he didn't just rehash it.

4317
04:30:51,568 --> 04:30:53,987
-Expanded it.
-As so-- as so many knock-offs did.

4318
04:30:54,071 --> 04:30:54,988
He expanded it.

4319
04:30:55,072 --> 04:30:56,782
<i>There they go! Over there! Get 'em!</i>

4320
04:30:58,367 --> 04:31:01,495
And we wound up revisiting it
much later at a time

4321
04:31:01,578 --> 04:31:05,290
when movie stars were doing
weekly TV shows.

4322
04:31:05,374 --> 04:31:09,169
And so we-- I rewrote the pilot episode

4323
04:31:09,252 --> 04:31:12,339
so that when the Russians get there,
Childs and MacReady are gone.

4324
04:31:12,422 --> 04:31:14,049
We're there-- we just-- we don't know
what happened to them.

4325
04:31:14,132 --> 04:31:17,594
And then the idea was,
and again this is just me

4326
04:31:17,678 --> 04:31:20,889
pitching my headcanon
because we never got this far,

4327
04:31:20,973 --> 04:31:26,478
um, would be that at the end
of the first season we've met

4328
04:31:26,561 --> 04:31:28,981
this new character, her-- her name
was Anne Blackburn.

4329
04:31:29,064 --> 04:31:31,441
She was sort of like the CDC specialist
who goes out

4330
04:31:31,525 --> 04:31:35,112
and what if at the end of the first season

4331
04:31:35,195 --> 04:31:39,700
you had this scene where she goes out
and she's driving to the woods,

4332
04:31:39,783 --> 04:31:43,370
you don't know where she's going
and she comes up to this cabin

4333
04:31:43,453 --> 04:31:46,123
out in the woods in the middle
of nowhere completely off the grid

4334
04:31:46,206 --> 04:31:49,418
and she goes up the door and knocks,

4335
04:31:49,501 --> 04:31:54,172
and the door opens and she says,
"Are you R.J. MacReady?"

4336
04:31:54,256 --> 04:31:56,383
And Kurt Russell comes out
with a shotgun and goes,

4337
04:31:56,466 --> 04:31:57,718
"Who wants to know?"

4338
04:32:04,975 --> 04:32:09,896
There's a lot of movies that leave
you hanging and you go, "Goddamn it."

4339
04:32:11,106 --> 04:32:13,692
But this one leaves you hanging
and you don't go, "Goddamn it",

4340
04:32:13,775 --> 04:32:17,988
you go, "Geez, I wonder why,
I wonder what hap--", you know,

4341
04:32:18,071 --> 04:32:21,366
it really continues to keep you
thinking about it.

4342
04:32:21,450 --> 04:32:22,659
<i>If you're worried about me--</i>

4343
04:32:22,743 --> 04:32:25,746
<i>If we've got any surprises for each other,</i>

4344
04:32:27,622 --> 04:32:30,083
<i>I don't think we're in much shape
to do anything about it.</i>

4345
04:32:30,167 --> 04:32:33,462
How do you ponder about
the questions of the cosmos?

4346
04:32:33,545 --> 04:32:35,088
-Sit down and drink, man. -Yeah.

4347
04:32:35,172 --> 04:32:39,009
The fire will go, you will die
and everything will move on.

4348
04:32:39,092 --> 04:32:42,095
-Yeah. Yeah, yeah. -It's so beautiful.

4349
04:32:42,179 --> 04:32:45,640
-It's very French. It's very European.
-Oh yeah, it's very European.

4350
04:32:45,724 --> 04:32:47,642
It's no wonder the Europeans
love Carpenter.

4351
04:32:47,726 --> 04:32:48,685
-Love this guy, yeah.
-Yeah. Yeah.

4352
04:32:48,769 --> 04:32:51,104
They have Sauter and they have Carpenter.

4353
04:32:51,188 --> 04:32:52,647
Movies today are so spoon-fed.

4354
04:32:52,731 --> 04:32:54,066
They have to have a satisfying ending

4355
04:32:54,149 --> 04:32:55,901
and blah, blah, blah.
It has to tie up and--

4356
04:32:55,984 --> 04:32:58,070
They don't want them-- studios
don't want movies testing low.

4357
04:32:58,153 --> 04:33:00,864
That's why movies are so boring,
'cause they cut all the edges off.

4358
04:33:00,947 --> 04:33:03,617
As a result, audiences are starting
to reject movies.

4359
04:33:03,700 --> 04:33:07,079
And they're going back to the old ones,
'cause the old ones had mystery.

4360
04:33:07,162 --> 04:33:10,082
And there's no movie that did it better
than <i>The Thing</i>.

4361
04:33:10,165 --> 04:33:12,042
It's a true mystery movie.

4362
04:33:12,125 --> 04:33:16,546
I asked John when he was on the show,
"I don't want to know the answer,

4363
04:33:16,630 --> 04:33:19,007
but I just want to know
if there is an answer."

4364
04:33:19,091 --> 04:33:20,759
And he said, "Yes, there's an answer."

4365
04:33:20,842 --> 04:33:25,263
And I said, "And can I know the answer
from watching the movie closely?"

4366
04:33:25,347 --> 04:33:26,598
And he said, "Yes."

4367
04:33:26,681 --> 04:33:29,059
It gets more and more, I guess,
more and more interesting

4368
04:33:29,142 --> 04:33:32,312
as time goes on about like,
"Well, well, I have-- nobody's…

4369
04:33:34,064 --> 04:33:35,899
had any sort of definitive answer."

4370
04:33:37,651 --> 04:33:41,863
- They want to know who survived,
who's the human in the end.

4371
04:33:41,947 --> 04:33:43,782
And I'm not telling them.

4372
04:33:43,865 --> 04:33:48,036
And that's what's kept this movie alive

4373
04:33:48,120 --> 04:33:50,163
is that question mark.

4374
04:33:50,247 --> 04:33:52,707
And it's still talked about today.

4375
04:33:53,708 --> 04:33:57,629
And if I ever give up the secret
of who's the human in the end,

4376
04:33:57,712 --> 04:33:58,880
I'll destroy it.

4377
04:34:00,173 --> 04:34:05,512
<i>Why don't we just wait here</i>
<i>for a little while.</i>

4378
04:34:08,515 --> 04:34:10,725
<i>See what happens.</i>

4379
04:34:14,938 --> 04:34:17,774
<i>- An alien creature had frozen.</i>

4380
04:34:19,276 --> 04:34:21,278
<i>But not to death.</i>

4381
04:34:34,541 --> 04:34:36,835
<i>I began getting postcards</i>
<i>at my newspaper office</i>

4382
04:34:36,918 --> 04:34:40,338
<i>from readers telling me that</i>
<i>John Carpenter's new movie,</i>

4383
04:34:40,422 --> 04:34:41,590
<i>I guess they'd seen it in a preview,</i>

4384
04:34:41,673 --> 04:34:43,967
<i>was one of the most disgusting films</i>
<i>ever made.</i>

4385
04:34:44,050 --> 04:34:47,929
What's interesting about
the reaction is that

4386
04:34:48,013 --> 04:34:52,017
the questions asked now
out of wonder by fans.

4387
04:34:52,100 --> 04:34:53,435
"Who's who at the end?

4388
04:34:53,518 --> 04:34:54,936
How did this happen?"

4389
04:34:55,020 --> 04:34:58,857
Uh, were asked in anger by the audiences

4390
04:34:58,940 --> 04:35:01,401
in previews, you know, 42 years ago.

4391
04:35:03,403 --> 04:35:07,324
The first preview, I remember
one person punching,

4392
04:35:07,407 --> 04:35:09,910
you know, a card, a preview card
with his pencil angrily

4393
04:35:09,993 --> 04:35:12,913
and then writing, you know,
"You forgot the other half of the movie."

4394
04:35:17,167 --> 04:35:19,961
- I remember the reviews were savage.

4395
04:35:20,045 --> 04:35:23,882
'Cause I remember the reviews
uh, saying all the characters

4396
04:35:23,965 --> 04:35:27,260
were the same and the gore
was the only distinction.

4397
04:35:27,344 --> 04:35:30,597
I-- I just thought,
"How can somebody misunderstand

4398
04:35:30,680 --> 04:35:32,307
a-- a movie so much?"

4399
04:35:34,226 --> 04:35:40,440
The critics were nearly all oldish
white male at that time,

4400
04:35:40,523 --> 04:35:45,570
uh, who'd been weaned on
uh, real cinema, you know,

4401
04:35:45,654 --> 04:35:48,657
like auteurism, Robert Bresson.

4402
04:35:51,534 --> 04:35:55,080
They thought special effects,
I think, were vulgar

4403
04:35:55,163 --> 04:35:58,375
and anything with a lot of
spectacular special effects

4404
04:35:58,458 --> 04:36:01,753
uh, had to be despised
to a certain degree.

4405
04:36:01,836 --> 04:36:04,256
It wasn't taken seriously, for-- for sure.

4406
04:36:05,465 --> 04:36:09,177
Goldie and I got together somewhere
around that time.

4407
04:36:09,261 --> 04:36:12,639
Somebody made a suggestion
to see <i>The Thing</i>.

4408
04:36:12,722 --> 04:36:17,602
And uh, Goldie's mom,
who was just a great person,

4409
04:36:18,687 --> 04:36:21,189
but a real no-bullshit mom, too.

4410
04:36:21,273 --> 04:36:23,191
She was great, just tell the truth.

4411
04:36:23,275 --> 04:36:26,236
She got about 20 minutes
into <i>The Thing</i> and she went,

4412
04:36:26,319 --> 04:36:28,863
"I can't, I can't." And she just got up

4413
04:36:28,947 --> 04:36:31,658
and was like,
"I don't like-- like it, Goldie."

4414
04:36:31,741 --> 04:36:35,578
I said, "Yeah, this is not--
not the right crowd."

4415
04:36:40,041 --> 04:36:41,418
But that was true for a lot of people.

4416
04:36:41,501 --> 04:36:44,212
They couldn't see the story of paranoia,

4417
04:36:44,296 --> 04:36:45,964
because they couldn't get past
that monster.

4418
04:36:46,047 --> 04:36:48,383
They just could not get past the monster.

4419
04:36:48,466 --> 04:36:50,760
You know, we had like a--
you know, like friends

4420
04:36:50,844 --> 04:36:54,180
and friends of friends screening,
the first public screening of the film

4421
04:36:54,264 --> 04:36:56,349
for anyone other than ourselves
in late March

4422
04:36:56,433 --> 04:37:00,812
when-- including Debra Hill, Nick Castle,
and a whole bunch of folks came to it.

4423
04:37:00,895 --> 04:37:03,940
The reaction then, I think, was
and it's you know, is that

4424
04:37:04,024 --> 04:37:07,027
John had taken things a step too far.

4425
04:37:07,110 --> 04:37:09,237
Uh, those were actually
Debra Hill's words.

4426
04:37:09,321 --> 04:37:11,364
It wasn't <i>Poltergeist</i> on ice,

4427
04:37:11,448 --> 04:37:13,533
which is probably what the studio
was looking for.

4428
04:37:18,246 --> 04:37:21,374
- I'll tell you exactly
why it didn't find an audience.

4429
04:37:21,458 --> 04:37:24,669
<i>The Thing</i> did not find an audience
because it came out,

4430
04:37:24,753 --> 04:37:27,213
what, three weeks after <i>E.T.</i>?

4431
04:37:28,715 --> 04:37:33,345
<i>He is afraid. He is totally alone.</i>

4432
04:37:36,348 --> 04:37:39,768
E.T., we'd-- we were-- I had never
cried in a movie before-- before <i>E.T.</i>

4433
04:37:39,851 --> 04:37:41,895
We were all phoned home.
We all had Reese's Pieces.

4434
04:37:41,978 --> 04:37:47,150
Everyone had dolls, like-- like
<i>E.T.</i> mania was everywhere.

4435
04:37:51,654 --> 04:37:53,531
Oh, it was the biggest thing ever.

4436
04:37:53,615 --> 04:37:55,116
People, like, literally there were stories

4437
04:37:55,200 --> 04:38:00,330
that "I took my-- I took my--
my mute son to <i>E.T.</i>

4438
04:38:00,413 --> 04:38:01,998
and at the end of it,
he turned to me and said,

4439
04:38:02,082 --> 04:38:05,752
I love you, Mommy.
And now he-- now he goes to Dartmouth."

4440
04:38:05,835 --> 04:38:09,297
You know, whatever.
People were being healed by <i>E.T.</i>

4441
04:38:09,381 --> 04:38:14,469
Really, there were stories like
urban myths about people who like,

4442
04:38:14,552 --> 04:38:18,098
walked out without their canes
after seeing <i>E.T.</i>

4443
04:38:18,181 --> 04:38:23,853
and-- and <i>The Thing</i>
is the exact opposite of that.

4444
04:38:23,937 --> 04:38:25,355
Well, I me-- it's okay.

4445
04:38:25,438 --> 04:38:29,025
I mean, I'm not a huge fan of <i>E.T.</i>

4446
04:38:29,943 --> 04:38:33,071
I didn't believe a minute
of that creature.

4447
04:38:33,154 --> 04:38:34,656
The Humpty Dumpty there.

4448
04:38:40,537 --> 04:38:42,789
But, uh, boy, the audience got it.

4449
04:38:42,872 --> 04:38:44,249
They-- they loved it.

4450
04:38:45,375 --> 04:38:48,086
It was Disney. A Disney alien kind of.

4451
04:38:48,169 --> 04:38:51,464
And then that's what Steven does so well.

4452
04:38:51,548 --> 04:38:54,259
He senses the audience. What did he say?

4453
04:38:54,342 --> 04:38:56,845
He thought the audience needed an upcry.

4454
04:38:57,720 --> 04:39:02,267
Of course, I didn't think that.
That's not my thinking.

4455
04:39:02,350 --> 04:39:06,438
They need to be shaken and scared. Always!

4456
04:39:07,939 --> 04:39:13,236
The genre filmmaking machine
was-- was operating at full capacity.

4457
04:39:13,319 --> 04:39:14,988
It was so good.

4458
04:39:15,071 --> 04:39:18,158
Every weekend there was another
movie coming out.

4459
04:39:18,241 --> 04:39:22,120
<i>Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan</i>,
<i>The Road Warrior</i>, <i>Creepshow</i>,

4460
04:39:22,203 --> 04:39:25,790
<i>Blade Runner</i>. It was like every weekend.

4461
04:39:31,337 --> 04:39:34,799
It was probably a strong pill
to swallow in the world of media

4462
04:39:34,883 --> 04:39:36,759
and culture to go right into <i>The Thing</i>,

4463
04:39:36,843 --> 04:39:40,013
which is one of the greatest paranoid
horror films ever made.

4464
04:39:40,096 --> 04:39:42,891
<i>Trapped in the frozen wasteland</i>
<i>of Antarctica…</i>

4465
04:39:45,643 --> 04:39:46,978
<i>it could not escape.</i>

4466
04:39:47,061 --> 04:39:51,816
I thought it-- there was gonna be
a big uh, response to it

4467
04:39:51,900 --> 04:39:56,821
and um, I was disappointed
when I first saw it.

4468
04:39:56,905 --> 04:40:01,534
Not with the work on screen,
but just with the way it was handled.

4469
04:40:01,618 --> 04:40:03,912
<i>-And man--</i>
<i>-It isn't Bennings.</i>

4470
04:40:03,995 --> 04:40:07,081
<i>- …is the warmest place to hide.</i>

4471
04:40:07,165 --> 04:40:12,003
So <i>The Thing</i> is like an R-rated movie,
there's no monster in the poster.

4472
04:40:12,086 --> 04:40:15,840
We love the poster. But at the time it's
like, "I can't really see the monster."

4473
04:40:15,924 --> 04:40:18,801
It was a-- a winter movie
released in June.

4474
04:40:18,885 --> 04:40:21,679
So I think if that movie
had come out you know,

4475
04:40:21,763 --> 04:40:24,807
a little bit farther away
from <i>E.T.</i>, it would've--

4476
04:40:24,891 --> 04:40:26,684
it would've done better at the box office.

4477
04:40:27,685 --> 04:40:29,687
I also think the fact
that it didn't do well is

4478
04:40:29,771 --> 04:40:31,689
one of the reasons people
love to champion it.

4479
04:40:34,067 --> 04:40:37,320
- So when it didn't connect
with an audience, you know,

4480
04:40:37,403 --> 04:40:39,405
it hit John hard.

4481
04:40:39,489 --> 04:40:43,535
I told him because he seemed
so down, I said, "Look",

4482
04:40:43,618 --> 04:40:46,704
and I believed it,
"This is going to be a classic

4483
04:40:46,788 --> 04:40:48,665
in 10 or 20 years."

4484
04:40:48,748 --> 04:40:51,292
And he was just very dismissive about it.

4485
04:40:51,376 --> 04:40:53,336
CARPENTER'S 'THING'
STOCKS UP ON SHOCK

4486
04:40:53,419 --> 04:40:55,380
Had <i>The Thing</i> been a hit,

4487
04:40:55,463 --> 04:40:58,383
I would have been offered a lot of stuff.

4488
04:40:58,466 --> 04:41:01,302
And I wouldn't have lost the job,
<i>Firestarter</i>.

4489
04:41:03,137 --> 04:41:06,641
- That eventually got made,
but we were actually gonna do it.

4490
04:41:06,724 --> 04:41:10,728
And we were, I don't know,
like eight weeks away

4491
04:41:10,812 --> 04:41:12,981
from photography or something like that.

4492
04:41:13,064 --> 04:41:15,775
We got called up to the tower.

4493
04:41:15,859 --> 04:41:17,777
A guy by the name of Tom Mount

4494
04:41:17,860 --> 04:41:20,238
was one of the production
executives there.

4495
04:41:21,698 --> 04:41:26,703
He says, I can remember,
"We realize the obligation that

4496
04:41:26,786 --> 04:41:31,040
we have to you both, but we've decided not
to proceed with the picture."

4497
04:41:33,793 --> 04:41:37,005
"What?" You know, it was like, "So".

4498
04:41:38,256 --> 04:41:39,507
And then that was it.

4499
04:41:39,591 --> 04:41:41,301
John and I got up, we walked out,

4500
04:41:41,384 --> 04:41:45,680
dead silence into the elevator,
down the elevator, back to the office.

4501
04:41:45,763 --> 04:41:49,767
Didn't say a fucking word for,
I don't know, 15, 20 minutes.

4502
04:41:51,019 --> 04:41:55,940
He risked and in many ways lost
a lot because of this bet.

4503
04:41:56,024 --> 04:42:00,153
'Cause he will probably tell you
that was a point of inflection,

4504
04:42:00,236 --> 04:42:04,741
where he started to losing the capacity
to do exactly what he wanted.

4505
04:42:07,201 --> 04:42:08,828
The-- one of the things
that's really cool to me

4506
04:42:08,912 --> 04:42:12,206
about John Carpenter
is he didn't sacrifice

4507
04:42:12,290 --> 04:42:14,042
appreciating it 40 years later,

4508
04:42:14,125 --> 04:42:18,546
50, 60 years later, 70 years,
100 years later…

4509
04:42:19,672 --> 04:42:23,259
for maybe it being more well accepted
than it ever would have been then.

4510
04:42:27,639 --> 04:42:32,060
I think it was uh, it attained
the highest honor I've seen

4511
04:42:32,143 --> 04:42:36,189
a horror movie attain,
which is the audience first rejects it.

4512
04:42:36,272 --> 04:42:37,940
'Cause it's breaking every boundary.

4513
04:42:39,275 --> 04:42:40,860
One of the few times in my lifetime

4514
04:42:40,943 --> 04:42:44,322
where I probably 10, 15 times
it's happened,

4515
04:42:44,405 --> 04:42:46,824
where you know
you're in front of a classic.

4516
04:42:46,908 --> 04:42:48,910
And you-- you-- you believe
you're watching

4517
04:42:48,993 --> 04:42:51,954
the <i>Gone with the Wind</i> of uh, brutality.

4518
04:42:57,418 --> 04:43:03,841
I was absolutely blown away
and I left kind of devastated

4519
04:43:03,925 --> 04:43:09,847
and depressed, because Rob and I
are about the same age

4520
04:43:09,931 --> 04:43:14,060
and I thought, "Oh my God,
is this what one has to do

4521
04:43:14,143 --> 04:43:15,978
to make a mark in the industry?"

4522
04:43:20,400 --> 04:43:24,153
I saw it very stoned…

4523
04:43:26,280 --> 04:43:27,615
uh, because I'm from Amsterdam

4524
04:43:27,699 --> 04:43:33,413
on a VHS I rented
with some friends at my house.

4525
04:43:33,496 --> 04:43:34,831
"Oh, we're gonna see a horror movie."

4526
04:43:34,914 --> 04:43:40,378
Uh, and everybody was just laughing
and I remember seeing it

4527
04:43:40,461 --> 04:43:44,507
and-- and being completely,
completely fixed into it.

4528
04:43:44,590 --> 04:43:49,637
I immediately recognized
this is something truly weird.

4529
04:43:50,513 --> 04:43:53,307
Seeing a movie the first time
is a casual date, right?

4530
04:43:53,391 --> 04:43:55,768
-You see it three times, you're dating.
-Yeah.

4531
04:43:55,852 --> 04:43:57,437
You see it more than six times,
you're married.

4532
04:43:57,520 --> 04:43:58,646
Yeah.

4533
04:44:03,276 --> 04:44:06,696
The Thing fans are the most enduring.

4534
04:44:06,779 --> 04:44:09,449
They are-- they're-- they're--
they're-- they're so loyal

4535
04:44:09,532 --> 04:44:12,702
and I-- I thank each and every
one of them, because they--

4536
04:44:12,785 --> 04:44:15,079
they keep it going. They keep it going.

4537
04:44:16,247 --> 04:44:19,792
The fact that John Carpenter
has not been forthcoming about

4538
04:44:19,876 --> 04:44:24,505
answering the mysteries of this film
makes it one

4539
04:44:24,589 --> 04:44:29,135
that you can come back to
and experience in a new way

4540
04:44:29,218 --> 04:44:30,887
and think about in new ways.

4541
04:44:33,473 --> 04:44:38,144
How many movies from that time
can you say that about

4542
04:44:38,227 --> 04:44:41,439
that get more interesting
for the audience?

4543
04:44:41,522 --> 04:44:46,694
The first thing we do as mammals is trying
to figure out a puzzle.

4544
04:44:46,778 --> 04:44:49,530
What are you gonna do with a puzzle?
Leave it alone?

4545
04:44:49,614 --> 04:44:51,616
Every piece of art is a puzzle.

4546
04:44:51,699 --> 04:44:54,952
You see a painting and somebody
is looking out-- out of a frame,

4547
04:44:55,036 --> 04:44:56,913
you want to know what they're looking at.

4548
04:44:59,081 --> 04:45:02,627
- It's unfinished business
and the film hasn't finished

4549
04:45:02,710 --> 04:45:05,630
and it hasn't absolutely finished
in popular culture,

4550
04:45:05,713 --> 04:45:07,965
because we've been talking
about it ever since.

4551
04:45:13,888 --> 04:45:16,849
I think on the simplest level
what it means to me is it's--

4552
04:45:16,933 --> 04:45:20,603
it's one of those movies that inspired me
to want to make movies.

4553
04:45:20,686 --> 04:45:22,647
<i>The Thing</i> is like my <i>When Harry Met Sally</i>.

4554
04:45:22,730 --> 04:45:24,357
It's my feel-good movie.

4555
04:45:24,440 --> 04:45:28,694
I am entirely absorbed like I've been
absorbed by <i>The Thing</i> itself.

4556
04:45:30,738 --> 04:45:35,243
- The reason why it stands up over time
is the ensemble uh,

4557
04:45:35,326 --> 04:45:39,288
led by a great movie star

4558
04:45:39,372 --> 04:45:43,251
backed by incredible artistic precision.

4559
04:45:43,334 --> 04:45:46,128
You feel like you're one of these men
who's trapped together.

4560
04:45:46,212 --> 04:45:49,632
So it puts you, you know,
without 3D goggles, it--

4561
04:45:49,715 --> 04:45:51,425
it places you in that camp. It--

4562
04:45:51,509 --> 04:45:53,427
You-- you live that experience with them.

4563
04:45:54,387 --> 04:45:58,850
- People have a kind of
spiritual experience

4564
04:45:58,933 --> 04:46:03,813
as they watch this film that
makes them want to watch it again.

4565
04:46:05,648 --> 04:46:07,567
I think it's a great storyline.

4566
04:46:07,650 --> 04:46:11,821
In the realm of imagination
this could happen.

4567
04:46:11,904 --> 04:46:15,825
Where you just can't stop diving in,
going into it and go,

4568
04:46:15,908 --> 04:46:18,619
"Wait, wait, wait a minute,
wait a minute, wait a minute."

4569
04:46:18,703 --> 04:46:22,665
And what's great about the movie
itself in that regard, I think,

4570
04:46:22,748 --> 04:46:27,420
that's fun to talk about is that
it was made that way.

4571
04:46:28,462 --> 04:46:29,964
It was intentional.

4572
04:46:30,047 --> 04:46:32,633
Every now and then a film
comes along like that

4573
04:46:32,717 --> 04:46:34,886
and it-- it does what that film did.

4574
04:46:34,969 --> 04:46:38,181
And uh, if you're a part of it,
you're just goddamn lucky.

4575
04:46:38,848 --> 04:46:41,267
CAST and CREW
THE THING

4576
04:46:41,350 --> 04:46:46,647
- John is a pioneer in a covered wagon
pondering by the fire at home,

4577
04:46:46,731 --> 04:46:50,484
"What lies beyond yonder
uh, in the horizon."

4578
04:46:50,568 --> 04:46:54,113
I mean, this is-- that's what's
quintessentially American about him.

4579
04:46:54,197 --> 04:46:59,869
He faces fear and horror
and outsized antagonism with a,

4580
04:46:59,952 --> 04:47:03,080
"Well, let's tackle it
one thing at a time."

4581
04:47:04,874 --> 04:47:08,586
<i>- The Thing</i> did something for me.
The people hating it.

4582
04:47:09,754 --> 04:47:15,384
It made me re-examine myself and uh…

4583
04:47:16,969 --> 04:47:21,724
I realized I can't lose myself
by trying to please people.

4584
04:47:21,807 --> 04:47:25,478
I'm gonna hang on to me.
And I'm so proud of that movie.

4585
04:47:25,561 --> 04:47:27,521
Like, I don't care what they thought.

4586
04:47:29,482 --> 04:47:34,612
That's uh-- it's hard to talk about it
now, but that's the truth.

4587
04:47:34,695 --> 04:47:36,155
That's the absolute truth.