THE THING - 4K UHD Coming This Fall

[Monterey Jack]

Use "gruvloyal20" at the Universal Gruv website to get 20% off a preorder of The Thing UHD. Mine came out to $17.24 after tax and with no shipping.

[AndyDursin]

Nice, locked that in.

[Monterey Jack]

Got my copy today, w/immaculate slipcover. I'm not gonna watch it for a few weeks, though, because my October horror marathon looms (look for more info possibly this weekend). I'm planning on a deep-dive triple feature of the 1951 original, Carpenter's remake, and the 2011 prequel, and I'm gonna title my essay/review "This, That and the other Thing".

[Monterey Jack]

People at BR.com have been bitching up a storm that the new 7.1 sound mix lacks bass and buries Morricone's score under the sound effects. Any truth to this, or is it typical hyperbole...?

[AndyDursin]

I checked this morning, comparing the Shout's 4.1 mix to the UHD -- I didn't detect what a lot of those posters are hearing. In fact I thought the UHD had plenty of bass. The 4.1 on Shout's is probably still preferable, it feels a little more "analog" and "airy" -- but there's still ample surround activity and separation in the UHD mix. Enough that I can live with it because the video is so superb.

The bass complaints I really don't get, if anything it's the left/right panning at times that seems a little reduced, the UHD mix is more "centered." I wonder if it's a case where some people are only using 2-channel sources at times, and the UHD is recorded at a lower volume so they think it "lacks punch."

[Monterey Jack]

Having watched the UHD yesterday, I have only two complaints about the new sound mix...first, is that the voice of MacReady's primitive chess computer (provided by Adrienne Barbeau) now sounds considerably lower in volume, and secondly, the loud, bullwhip-like SNAP of the Norris-head's tongue latching onto the chair leg is now barely audible! Other than those, though, I had no problems with the rest, and compared to some truly awful, revisionist 5.1 remixes (The Terminator. An American Tail), I can accept these two small hiccups in lieu of how smashing the movie looks in 4K.

[Monterey Jack]

Holy crap, I finally managed to dig up Owen Gleiberman's review of this from the pages of the recently-digitized Boston Phoenix.

https://archive.org/details/sim_boston- ... ew=theater

It's not as wildly effusive as I've been led to believe -- he heaps praise on Rob Bottin's gooey monster F/X while still referring to the rest of the film as taut yet somewhat routine -- but it's a treat to find a review of the film from the summer of '82 that didn't completely trash it.

[Monterey Jack]

...and here's Gleiberman's interview with Rob Bottin, where he gushes about his F/X wizardry:

https://archive.org/details/sim_boston- ... ew=theater

Anyways, watched the film on UHD again today, because there's nothing better to watch during a blizzard...

[Monterey Jack]

Looks like there's gonna be a Fathom Events screening of this on June 19th to celebrate the film's 40th(!!) anniversary...and that happens to be the first day of my June vacation. Looks like I'll finally be able to see this on the big screen.

[Monterey Jack]

Looks like there's gonna be a Fathom Events screening of this on June 19th to celebrate the film's 40th(!!) anniversary...and that happens to be the first day of my June vacation. Looks like I'll finally be able to see this on the big screen.

Saw it tonight with an ex-coworker, and we both had a blast. The film looked and sounded great (supposedly this past Sunday's screening had a subpar A/V presentation and was even cropped to 1.85:1! Thankfully Mick Garris and John Carpenter made such a stink on social media it shamed Fathom Events into striking a 4K presentation for tonight's screenings), and it was a thrill to finally see Dean Cundey's striking photography and Rob Bottin's gorgeously grotesque makeup F/X creations on a big screen. The audience seemed into it as well (probably over 20 all-told). I can cross this one off my list of classic movies I've finally seen on the big screen.

[AndyDursin]

Glad it was fun and worthwhile! But they ought to be showing that kind of quality EVERY TIME. There's no excuse not to.

That's why I don't pay to see most of these Fathom runs. "Seeing it on the big screen" is a great idea but when most of the time they are running a Blu-Ray or worse in, locally, a small theater it's just not worth it.

[Monterey Jack]

Glad it was fun and worthwhile! But they ought to be showing that kind of quality EVERY TIME. There's no excuse not to.

In the fall of 2020, when theaters had just barely reopened and there was a dearth of new content to screen, all of the "comeback" screenings I attended looked and sounded great, so I don't know why they half-ass these Fathom screenings. It was only the combined grousing of John Carpenter and Mick Garris that got them to screen The Thing properly for tonight's showings. I mean, in many cases it will be the only time fans get to see their favorites on the big screen, so they should be given the same quality presentation as any new movie unspooling. It's a minimum of effort to make these look and sound good, and The Thing took in like a half-million for the (botched) Sunday screenings, so it's just gonna harm these screenings in the future when fans and the creators complain about how badly their favorites are being presented.