NYCC '10 First Impressions 'The Thing': Filmmakers Didn't Want To "Paint On The Mona Lisa"

The one resounding sentiment that you got out of both the New York Comic Con panel and the newly unveiled teaser trailer for Universal's upcoming prequel "The Thing" is that the filmmakers are very respectful of the John Carpenter film that it's based upon. (His film, of course, was based on Howard Hawks' original "The Thing From Another World.") What's funny is reconciling this with what Carpenter has said repeatedly about any filmmaker that wants to remake or embellish on something that he has done, which he has said boils down to him opening up his hand, someone placing a check in his hand, and then him closing his hand.

But anyway, the first thing that the assembled "Thing" crew (director Matthijs van Heijningen, actors Joel Edgerton, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Eric Christian Olsen and Ulrich Thomsen, and producers Marc Abraham and Eric Newman) did was show the newly cut ("I was still mixing it yesterday," said director van Heijningen) teaser trailer for the film, which is scheduled for release in 2011.

The clip started out with shots of a dreary 1980s-era New York, where two young scientists - Mary Elizabeth Winstead (who wasn't at the panel because she was getting married, thus dashing two dreams of ours in one go) and Eric Christian Olsen, chat in a cafe. Olsen is trying to convince her to come to Antarctica with him, to become part of an expedition. "What I'm offering you is an opportunity to get out in the field and do something BIG," Olsen says. "Do you actually know what it is?" she asks. "No," he answers.

From there we get quick clips of the Norwegian camp from the first film, with some great narration by expedition leader Thomsen about how "man's sense of identity, religion, culture, civilization, has forever been altered," which goes along with some eerie Norwegian folk singing and some great shots of a drill burrowing through the alien's "ice coffin," along with scary things happening, people with flame throwers, and oogie-boogie monsters. The footage looked solid but was the perfect "get the people whooping at Comic Con" set of images: clearly referential of the original film that all the geeks know and love, while not actually showing anything of substance (that could be picked apart on the internet - like right here!) It was a scrutiny-free sizzle reel. But that said, the images did look good, and even if it doesn't live up to the Carpenter original, which it almost certainly will not, it could be a fun, gooey sci-fi romp.

This was the first time the teaser had been unveiled to anyone, including members of the cast. "I was really scared, and I know what happens," Olsen quipped when asked for his impression.

"It started for us after we finished "Dawn of the Dead," which we made with Zack Snyder for Universal. We were looking at the Universal library and one of the great titles in that library is "The Thing." I don't know if you can tell from the trailer, but this movie precedes the Carpenter movie, this takes place in the Norwegian camp visited in the Carpenter movie. We made no attempt to remake "The Thing" because it's a brilliant movie and it would be very difficult to try and make a contemporary movie. Universal was very kind to let us set a movie in the Carpenter universe and keep it in that universe, and we're pretty pleased with how it ended up," producer Eric Newman said, as to why he wanted to revisit "The Thing."

"We didn't want to be in the business of painting the mustache on the Mona Lisa," fellow producer Mark Abraham added. "Once we convinced Universal that there was a real reason to do a prequel, we jumped in pretty heavily and decided to try and find the pieces in the Carpenter film that we had to match up with our picture. That became the puzzle, that became the script, we had to reverse-engineer. We actually met Mathijis through Zack Snyder [they're working on a Las Vegas-set zombie movie called "Army of the Dead"]."

On the decision to name it, simply, "The Thing," Newman said: "There were a couple of considerations that went into that. One of the great things about the Carpenter movie, and John was the first person to say this when we talked to him about it, but his was a remake of the Howard Hawks version, and ideally we loved the idea of our movie living in that universe, that world. And I thought about "Exorcist: The Heretic." There are always these colon titles that felt reverential than just calling it "The Thing." It's the same monster. And it's not a sequel. There was never any idea to throw in a subtitle. It would have felt like a videogame or something."
"I saw the movie when I was 15, I adored the movie, but as a European I was really interested in these poor bastards in the Norwegian camp. So I've always had a little idea about what happened in that camp. How did he get through the door? Who were these people? Were they Norwegians or was there another nationality? So my fascination came from that Norwegian part. So when I heard they were trying to do a prequel, I knew I wanted to be a part of that," director van Heijningen stated, in his interest in the project.

The actors rattled off their various parts, and they're a typically ragtag band — Edgerton and Akinnuoye-Agbaje are helicopter pilots that fly back and forth between the camps (including the American camp) and are eventually tasked with transporting the otherworldly beast; Eric Christian Olsen, as stated before, is a young biologist helping his mentor on the Antarctica expedition; and Ulrich Thomsen is the German head of the expedition. (The Norwegian actors are all overseas, working.)

"When we reconstructed, from all the clues in John Carpenter's movie, and we said that we would tell the story of the Norwegians, obviously the studio wouldn't buy it with an all-Norwegian cast," director van Heijningen said on the ethnic diversity in the cast. He went on to describe Mary Elizabeth Winstead as a "Ripley-type character. She becomes the heroine, not because she wants to but she's the smartest one on the block and if she doesn't do anything, everyone will die."
But what about the creature? CGI? Puppets? What? Director Matthijs van Heijningen answers: "One of the things I wanted to do was have the monster be practical. Now that everything is CGI, I really pushed hard for having practical monsters. And it's not only as a tribute to Carpenter. It's my experience that with actors, say you have a Norwegian guy with a flame thrower, and you say "Okay, you're going to see a green tennis ball" - his reaction will be different than if he sees a 7-foot monster. It was important we had as many real monsters as possible."

As for what the monster will look like, the director teased: "You've never seen The Thing in its pure form, but the question is — is that its pure form? It could have come from another planet and taken over that form. But we will see it in its original form, when they get it out of the ice. Then it escapes from the ice and starts attacking these guys." What remains to be seen is just how "pure," "The Thing" prequel will be. Guess we'll have to wait until April 29, 2011 to find that out for ourselves.

>>> NYCC '10 First Impressions 'The Thing': Filmmakers Didn't Want To "Paint On The Mona Lisa" >>>

Kicking Ass And Chewing Bubblegum SANS Sunglasses? Writer Hired For Remake Of John Carpenter's 'They Live'

At New York Comic Con, remake happy Strike Entertainment producer Eric Newman took time out from promoting "The Thing" to discuss the company's plans for John Carpenter's "They Live." In the original, Roddy Piper plays a homeless wanderer who finds a batch of sunglasses that help him uncover a global conspiracy led by aliens trying to seduce humans into complacency through Reagan-era capitalism. He then shoots them all in the face.

Apparently, the glasses might not be an integral part of the remake. I09 spoke to Newman, who revealed D.B. Weiss ("Game Of Thrones") would be writing the remake, and he shared details about what they are considering for this planned update. When asked about the sunglasses, he said, "We're discussing that. I'd like to say that really, a vagrant wandering around the streets could get you to try on his sunglasses, if he would leave you alone afterwards. He may even pay you $100, 'Hey put these on.' So we're kind of exploring different versions of what is that thing that allows you to see. But I'm not going to tell you what it is. It might be something different than sunglasses." So that's what caused JC's seizure this weekend (Get well, John).

If not glasses, then what? "They Live" is the sort of idea that could probably be adapted for each generation, but one of the more memorable scenes of an unforgettable movie is Piper trying to convince Keith David to "Put on the glasses!" via fistfight, resulting in one of the longest onscreen fistfights in cinematic history. To try to top it is foolish, but to eliminate it entirely? Perish the thought.

>>> Kicking Ass And Chewing Bubblegum SANS Sunglasses? Writer Hired For Remake Of John Carpenter's 'They Live' >>>

NYCC '10 'The Thing' Remake; Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje Calls It An "Orgy Of Blood"

"An orgy of blood" was how "The Thing" was described at NY Comic Con by Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, one of the stars of the upcoming prequel. The cast, producers and director unspooled a brief teaser for the film for the Comic Con crowd, but it offered very little hint as to what's going on in the film. It does take place at the Norwegian base seen in John Carpenter's horror classic, long after inhabitants fell prey to an unseen creature, and cast and crew confirmed it does lead into the Carpenter film. But how?

Akinnuoye-Agbaje said that he is among the American characters in the film, who arrive at the base for various reasons. "It’s a conflict between Americans and Norweigans," he says. "We don’t like them, and they don’t like us. They think we’re lazy and brash and arrogant. We think they’re crazy. And drunk! And these guys are always going at it, drinking whiskey to stay warm. Me and Joel [Edgerton], our characters, we’re just aboard to make a buck, that’s all we care about.

Edgerton, who has more than a passing resemblance to Kurt Russell, echoed this. "In the movie," he said, "we were sent to all the bases by helicopter, and that’s how we get in touch with this motley crew of scientists." As a big fan of the original, he claimed, "We tried to make a movie that was complementary to the Carpenter version." When discussing the "rules" of the film, he demurred to the Carpenter version. "The rules allow for definite arguments as to certain rules, which I think is great. We didn’t try to answer every question. For example, I did some research and learned that in the original movie, Kurt Russell and others on the set were having large arguments that, if you were the alien, would you know you are the alien? Are you aware that you’re the alien? Which I think is a very great question. How aware are of you are those things? I love the mystery the first film is left with. And we did shoot a couple of scenes in different ways, so I think that helped with the ambiguity."
"The Thing" is the directorial debut for Matthijs van Heijningen, a commercial helmer, but it wasn't supposed to be. Heijningen was handpicked by Zack Snyder to direct "Army of the Dead," a big budget zombie picture set in Las Vegas. He confirmed the death of the project right before the Writer's Strike, saying, "I was about to do a movie that fell through three months before shooting. A big zombie movie with Zack Snyder, 'Army of the Dead.' We were really prepping that movie and at the last minute they pulled the plug, so after six months of our work, there was nothing."
Van Heijningen came aboard the project while Strike Entertainment, where Snyder remade "Dawn of the Dead," was considering a script by "Battlestar Galactica" creator Ron Moore, but Van Heijningen had a good reason to axe that draft - he hated it. "When I came on, there was already the Ronald Moore version, which I didn’t really like, for the reason that we knew what The Thing was, and the point is that you SHOULDN’T know. So we basically started from scratch afterwards."
Not all of his ideas were used, however. Bringing on Mary Elizabeth Winstead to a very macho cast of men led to a number of discussions about the Thing getting sexy with his/her bad self. "We had had these discussions about sexuality. We had seen a Werner Herzog doc, 'Encounters At The End Of The World,' and at the end, everybody is sexless! They’re these sexless entities, like seals and stuff. But I thought it might be too obvious."

Not too obvious is the fact that, with a release date so far off, the studio is eying reshoots. Eric Christen Olsen confirmed as much when talking about pocketing certain prosthetics. "Well, I'd love to, but there’s still reshoots, so you can’t do anything with them. But I should put that in my contract. They’re packed away in a box somewhere, waiting to be used again. At one point, we had them with us, and customs stopped us, and they opened one of those boxes, and it’s The Thing… in a box! He FREAKED out. They sent in the SWAT, there were cops. It was crazy."

"The Thing" opens on April 29th, 2011. Btw, if you're into bootleg trailers, one has hit the web, but if you're a fan, you should probably wait for the real thing as it's shot off a screen and doesn't look great.

>>> NYCC '10 'The Thing' Remake; Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje Calls It An "Orgy Of Blood" >>>

First Look At Prequel To John Carpenter's 'The Thing'

The prequel to John Carpenter's "The Thing" has surprisingly managed to gain a small amount of geek approval as the message coming from the filmmakers is that it will honor the source material by very carefully using it as a launching pad to tell the story about the Norwegian team and the origins of the titular creature. Though it begs the question as to why they're using the title of the first film.

Anyway, we now have our first look at images both in front and behind the camera for the upcoming thriller. Directed by newcomer Matthis van Heijningen Jr. and starring Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Joel Edgerton, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje and Eric Christian Olsen these first snaps look pretty good. Obviously, some coin was spent on the production and it looks like a slick, icy piece of work.

Universal feels good about the prospects of the film, scheduling it for an April 29, 2011 release. More pictures after the jump.

>>> First Look At Prequel To John Carpenter's 'The Thing' >>>