Credit: Nathan Hartley Maas

John Carpenter says ‘The Thing’ cinematographer is “full of shit”

Fri 13 October 2023 10:50, UK

Of all the cliffhanger endings in cinema, the 1982 science-fiction horror classic The Thing by John Carpenter remains among the most contested and debated.

Perhaps more so than whether Deckard is a replicant in Blade Runner or if Leonardo DiCaprio’s Teddy Daniels knows he’s gone crazy in Shutter Island, fans have wondered – is Kurt Russell’s R J MacReady or Keith David’s Childs secretly the alien at the end of The Thing?

A prevailing theory is that it is indeed Childs and that MacReady knows this. After offering him a nip of whiskey, the two begin laughing as MacReady says, “Why don’t we wait here, see what happens.” The originator of this theory, however, is The Thing‘s cinematographer, Dean Cundey.

According to Cundey, a distinct and singular gleam of light can be spotted in the eyes of anyone infected by the extraterrestrial parasite. And, if viewers look, very closely, a certain light can be detected in the eyes of Childs as he faces off MacReady at the very end.

Carpenter, however, has no time for this. Speaking to ComicBook, the acclaimed genre director said that Cundey “has no clue”, that only he himself knows “who’s the Thing and who’s not in the very end.” Unfortunately for fans, he’s not interested in telling us. “Nope. Cannot tell you. Sorry.”

Never one to pull his punches, having been very vocal about filmmakers in the past, Carpenter tore into Cundey, saying, “He doesn’t know. He has no idea. He puts the lights up. He puts the lights up, and we were in the snow. He has no clue. You tell him that. Tell him he’s full of shit.”

It seems a little excessive to refer to the cinematographer of a gorgeously shot and beloved movie as simply someone who “puts the lights up”, but there you have it.

Watch the iconic scene below.